Our journey to B Corp™
In June 2024, Orangery became a Certified B Corporation™ (otherwise known as a B Corp).
What is B Corp?
Good question, glad you asked. B Corporation is an accreditation from B Lab UK that recognises businesses dedicated to maintaining high standards of social and environmental performance, accountability, and transparency.
Achieving B Corp status is no small feat. It involves a thorough evaluation of how a company upholds governance and impacts its workers, customers, community, and the environment. The process puts businesses under the microscope, making sure that they aren’t just talking a big game but actually making it happen across the board.
It isn’t a one-time achievement, either. By certifying, B Corps step into a framework for continuous improvement, pledging to meet rising standards and create a meaningful impact for all stakeholders.
How did we get there?
This has been both a professional and personal journey for me. I’ll start by hitting rewind, all the way back to the fall of 2022, when I stepped through the (now orange) door at the top of High Street and met a passionate team of designers and a pretty cool developer. It didn’t take long to fall in with this team of like-minded individuals. I don’t recall the exact wording, but there was a conversation in which ‘B Corp’ was dropped, and from that moment on, I made it my mission to learn about the process and see how we could get there.
In January 2023, we stumbled upon B Local Surrey’s launch event and made a point to attend. There we met and networked with local businesses that had achieved B Corp certification and many others that were in various stages of their journey. We left this meetup feeling inspired and then got to work filling out the infamous Impact Assessment.
ASSESSMENT
Far from a set of checkboxes, the assessment was a rigorous process that required us to dive deep into every aspect of the business. There were a lot of half answered questions and guesses on our first pass through, so we called in some reinforcements. Andy Marshall of Harrison Brands helped guide us through the assessment process (he made it seem so easy) and we eventually got to the point where we realised we could really do this.
Self-promotional plug-in: It was through Andy that we also learned about People Planet Pint, which prompted me to start a People Planet Pint meetup here in Guildford – with the goal to build a bigger local community for individuals and businesses interested in sustainability. Come check it out, really, it’s fun and you get a free pint!
Throughout the year, we took a close look at our customers and suppliers, implemented new policies, and and reevaluated the ways in which our business is run – an intensive process, especially if you’re fitting this around your regular work, but definitely worth it.
SUBMISSION
In January 2024, with all our ducks in a row, we clicked the submit button, thus adding ourselves to the evaluation queue. After a few months of queuing (I’m told this is a beloved British pastime) we were assigned an analyst and went through the process of providing further evidence to back up our responses. After a few weeks of this, we got the confirmation that we so longed to hear. We passed!
The assessment requires a minimum score of 80, and we were certified with a score of 82.4. While not the most impressive score out there, we are proud nonetheless. This score gives us room to grow and that is exactly the purpose of this journey: to keep growing and pushing forward, to keep adapting and learning new ways to run a business with people and the planet in mind.
We’re passionate about design and we believe in a world made better by design.
Being B Corp certified doesn’t make us perfect. But it does join us with a global community of businesses striving for positive change. More than a badge of honour, it’s our public promise to keep pushing, keep growing, and keep using business as a force for good.
We look forward to seeing where this journey will lead us.
