By Grain Sustainability,

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You've probably heard about B Corps, or Certified B Corporations. From the Guardian to Ben & Jerry's, Triodos bank to the Body Shop, there are currently over 6,000 B Corps in 89 countries, with more than 1,000 in the UK alone.

The aim of B Corps is to use business as a force for good. As B Lab, the non-profit behind the B Corp movement, says: We need an inclusive, equitable and regenerative economic system for all people and the planet.

There's a rigorous process to become certified which starts by filling in the open-source tool, the B Impact Assessment, which evaluates the business across five impact areas: Governance, Workers, Community, Environment, and Customers.

Though only for-profit companies can be certified, any organisation can use the B Impact Assessment as a framework to evaluate their own purpose and impact.

In this talk, we will cover:

• What it means to be a B Corp
• Which types of companies can become B Corps
• What are the benefits
• How to become a B Corp
• How long it will take
• How much it will cost
• Proposed changes to the standards

We will also present a case study of what this process looked like for Priory Direct, which is in the final stages of certification. Priory Direct supplies sustainable packaging to over 21,000 businesses, tackling supply chain and operational challenges to reduce the impact of ecommerce on the environment. The company's ultimate goal is to make ecommerce a truly sustainable industry by driving awareness and action through advocacy and access to solutions. This means creating an industry that truly contributes to society, the biosphere, and our economy, one challenge and one customer at a time. Josh Pitman, who will be joining us, is the company's Managing Director.

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