Pop the champagne! Once Upon a Tuesday is now officially a BCorporation!

We have been working towards becoming certified as a B Corporation, a.k.a a BCorp - which we have now achieved! Someone Pinch me. 

Not that it comes as a complete surprise, as we have grafted away at this over the past year and a half - so we had high hopes of achieving it and following in the footsteps of people we greatly admire - who are also choosing to do business for good.  

We’re joining a global movement of like-minded businesses pushing for change - you’ll recognise some of the names that are already certified, like Patagonia, Riverford, Abel & Cole, Faith in Nature, Neom Organics, Lick Home, Finisterre and our neighbours here, Petalon Flowers - plus so many more inspirational brands that are using business as a force for good. 

My fascination with sustainably conscious business started many moons ago, fuelled by places like The Eden Project here in Cornwall, as well as many talks and training sessions with inspirational people, which I hungrily attended for many years. 

I always dreamed of running a business, and particularly a BCorp certified one - so this is a huge moment for me and the team.

We’re not meant to talk about our status in comparison to other BCorps, but I just have to share that we are the very first and only stationery brand to be certified as BCorp in the U.K. 

We obviously hope to see more of the industry join us in the future. 

What is a BCorp?

BCorps are companies verified by BLab to meet the highest standards of social and environmental performance, transparency, and accountability. 

To be certified, companies go through a thorough assessment to analyse the five areas of their business - governance, workers, community, environment and customers - and analyse their strengths and weaknesses in each area. 

Scores are attributed to each area and the total score needs to exceed the 80 points standard set by BLab. (The median organisation score is around 50 points)

We have certified with 106.3 points! Which is comfortably above the 80 points, but with lots of room to improve and aim for the top score, which is rumoured to be 200 points, although I am not sure it’s ever been achieved.

“BCorp is a stamp of approval, showing that we are putting the right groundwork in place to achieve better business.”

What does BCorp mean for us as a small business?

What does it mean for our everyday? Every decision we make is intentional and considered, it always has been, but with BCorp ingrained in our processes, we now document things better and have guidelines on how to do better in each area of the business. 

Cost and profit are never the sole drivers, even though that would make our lives far easier, it is also the reason for many of our modern world problems. 

Instead, we consider the planet, the community, our people and our impact, in the small and the large decisions.  

If you were sat here, in our open plan studio amongst the fields of Cornwall, you'd hear that nearly all our conversations come with many layers and perspectives, which often contradict one another - the better option for profit, is usually not the better option for the environment, in the short term anyways. 

We started this brand with the intention to create an organisation that is run the way we would love to see ALL businesses run around the globe - one that considers not only profit but also people and the planet. 

Joining the BCorp movement means some acknowledgement of what we stand for, and how we run our company. 

It also gives us a community that will show us the way to continuous improvement.

Having been through the rigorous certification process, we learnt many ways to improve based on scientific insights and valuable research and data.

So, what’s changed?

We've always focussed on building positive impact into the business and based on our learnings going through the process, we were able to make more improvements.  Here are some areas we have updated: 

For example;

• We joined the Living Wage Foundation and are committed to paying at least the Real Living Wage, which sits significantly above the national living wage.
• We’ve ensured our Pension scheme has green pots and shared with the team how to move over to that option.
• We offer training opportunities in areas like personal finance to the team.
• We have worked with our current suppliers to document their sustainable practices and have created ethical and sustainable standards for any suppliers we work with in the future. 
• We’ve incentivised ride sharing for the team.
• We’ve transformed the hiring process to communicate and assess without bias and to promote inclusivity. 
• Instead of buying new, we now buy all our electronics refurbished where possible.
• We’re putting even more emphasis into sourcing close to home and supporting the local economy. 
• We've introduced team Volunteer days

Those are just a few of the changes we have made. 

By no means are we perfect, nor are the other BCorp brands, nor is the BCorp certification - but we have all agreed that we intend to strive for better.

A huge shout out to the people who have helped us along the way:

Team Tuesday, every one of you has showed up in amazing ways to support this journey. Thank you guys - we are so lucky to have you all on this journey with us. 

Grace Reith, our coach - hero!

B23 - Leap Media and Wildanet, who organised an incredible series of events guiding us through the certification process - aren’t we lucky to have such brilliant and caring people on our doorstep!

And one of the first BCorps local to us, without whom the seed would not have been planted all those years ago, Finisterre.

This is just the beginning. 

X Michele & Angus