B Corp: alcohol-free drinks as a force for good

We’re really excited to announce that Club Soda has become a certified B Corp organisation. It’s been a long time in the making and we’re really proud that our social impact business is now recognised as being a social and environmental force for good.

But we’re not the only ones in the alcohol-free sector who have received this accolade. We know that living well is so much more than being responsible for our alcohol intake and it’s up to businesses to be ethically responsible across the board. Our podcast guests this week, all B Corp certified distributors, brands, and influencers in the low and no sector, join us in celebrating alcohol-free drinks as a force for good.

What is B Corp?

B Corp is an international, voluntary certification for companies awarded for their social and environmental performance. At Club Soda, we’re super excited to be registered as a B Corp organisation as it means that it’s not just our community that benefits from our impact, but also the way in which we do business is also a force for good. Volunteering for a B Corp certificate means that we believe that you can make a profit and do good, allowing us to live up to our core values. This involves a rigorous assessment of our company’s impact on our stakeholders, community, and the wider society. Paul Hargreaves, B Corp ambassador and founder of specialty wholesalers Cotswold Fayre, explains a little more about the B Corp certification process in this podcast episode.

There’s a fairly rigorous certification process that you have to go through. And it’s in five areas; governance, workers, community, environment, and customer. So you have to be significantly better than the average company within your sector.

Paul Hargreaves

Who else in our sector has the B Corp certification?

The aim of our community is to help make the world a better place for those who want to change their drinking. It’s no surprise, then, that we’re not the only organisation that’s volunteering to be a force for good. Our podcast guests this week include:

Amanda Thomson of Thomson & Scott

Amanda is one of the founders of Thomson & Scott which produce the Noughty AF sparkling – and now beautiful still – wine. This is one of the few alcohol-free brands which has proudly had B Corp status right from the beginning of their endeavours.

We’ve still got huge, huge steps to take in the wine industry. And I’m always innovating and trying to do better and that’s part of being a B Corp is always striving to innovate. It’s a constant work in progress. I’m really delighted you’re joining the club. But yeah, it involves pretty much trying to do better on a daily basis, I suppose.

Amanda Thomson, Noughty AF

Felix and Eddie from Freestar

Freestar is an alcohol-free beer that leaves a great taste in your mouth and an ethical stamp on the world. Much like Thomson and Scott, Freestyle has been a certified B Corp business from its inception in 2017, where they were determined to not only create an alcohol-free beer they could be proud of but also a company that they could be proud of.

I think that you know, being proud of a business these days means that it has a social and environmental conscience. I mean, it’s always had so that to a certain extent, but none more so than now, I’m gonna suppose it probably is because we’re part of this younger generation. So, when we were having that discussion, you know, we wanted to work out how best to keep ourselves honest. It’s fine to know that you’re doing good, but actually, to have some third party come in and look at your business was always going to be the way forward. So we looked at all of the accreditations that are around at the time, and nothing really was as holistic as B Corp.

Felix Von Hurter, Freestar

Joelle Drummond from Drop Bear Beer

Drop Bear Beer are Wales’ largest alcohol-free brewery and has added Wales’ first B Corp brewery to its list of achievements. The Welsh-Australian company lives by its company strapline to brew up a sustainable future, and being part of the B Corp family is integral to the integrity of this exciting organisation, which has always strived to be a force for good in the industry.

Our mission is to brew the best possible alcohol-free beers and build a better world in which to drink them. And that very much encapsulates our responsibility to people and the planet…we always knew we wanted to use it as a force for good, even if we were only small and could only make little positive impacts. That translated into us getting rid of our car, and getting an electric car, because we knew we were going to all these sales meetings across the country, and we didn’t want to be using diesel for those. So that was a big commitment at that time. But you know, small things like that lead to bigger committments.

Joelle Drummond, Drop Bear Beer