Our B Corp Origin Story
/By Dani Babineau
March is B Corp Month, and it’s a pretty special one for us because it’s our first time celebrating as a bonafide Certified B Corp.
When we announced our certification last fall, we talked about the 18-month process of tracking our efforts and getting everything reviewed, but the truth is that our B Corp story started a long, long time ago, in the early days of our brewery planning.
When we first started conceptualizing the company back in circa 2012, a big part of our motivation was to be very community-focused and environmentally sustainable. This was important to us because, one, we wanted our business to be aligned with our personal values, and, two, these values were already alive and well in the just-starting-to-explode craft beer industry, and were some of the biggest draws of the industry to us. We loved how local breweries like Sam Adams and Wormtown wove themselves into the fabric of their communities, and how places like Maine Beer Co. gave back so much even as a fledgling brewery, and how Allagash found ways big and small to reduce waste across their organization. These things made us excited about the industry and we knew we wanted to help share these values with more people through our business.
The first time we actually learned about B Corps was a few years later at the 2015 Craft Brewers Conference in Portland, OR. One of the seminars was about how to build sustainable and impactful businesses that give back to the community. Although the description didn’t mention B Corps, it ended up being one big B Corp party, with speakers from B Corp breweries such as New Belgium, Brewery Vivant, and Beau’s.
We learned two really important things about B Corps from that seminar:
That being a B Corp would be a way for us to rubber stamp all the things we wanted to do and guide us in the right direction. Sold!
The paperwork and new systems and processes involved with becoming a B Corp was typically the most difficult part for existing breweries seeking certification. It’d be a lot easier to build toward being a B Corp from the beginning.
From there on out, we set out to become a B Corp and haven’t looked back since - and it’s been one of the best decisions we’ve made as a business. We’ll outline some of the biggest benefits of being a B Corp in a future post, but in the meantime we suggest you celebrate B Corp Month by learning more about and supporting B Corps in your area!
Find more information about B Corps at https://bcorporation.net/
