The Sourcing Team are delighted to become certified B Corp building on our ethical and sustainable heritage

The Sourcing Team is now part of a community of over 3,400 businesses globally who have certified as B Corps. The UK B Corp community has over 330 companies and include well-known brands such as The Guardian, innocent, Patagonia, The Body Shop, and organic food pioneers Abel & Cole.

We are really proud of this achievement joining a growing group of companies who are reinventing business by demonstrating our social and environmental standards showing our commitment by pursuing purpose as well as profit. This builds on our ethos, heritage, commitment and reputation as having a sustainable and ethical approach to business.

The Sourcing Team is a promotional marketing and sourcing company who has taken time to grow our knowledge, find the best partners and challenge ourselves to help create new, inventive solutions. We strive to be part of the change, driving better behaviours that improve lives of people and communities and protect our precious planet.

The process of becoming certified has been really interesting and has helped us further evolve our social and environmental approach. The B Corp certification addresses covers five key impact areas of:
• Governance
• Workers
• Community
• Environment
• Customers

The certification process is rigorous, we were required to reach a benchmark score of over 80 while providing evidence of socially and environmentally responsible practices relating to energy supplies, waste and water use, worker compensation, diversity and corporate transparency. To complete our certification, The Sourcing Team will now legally embed our commitment to purpose beyond profit in our company articles.

And how does this impact on us, our team and our clients
Clients can be safe in the knowledge that through rigorous testing and certification our ethos and values along with approach and processes are designed to have a positive impact on our employees, communities and the environment and aspire to do no harm and benefit all.

Gill Thorpe, CEO of The Sourcing Team says, “The marketing and sourcing of promotional products industry has much to do in really changing how we operate. This includes improving knowledge and understanding of what good looks like, helping pioneer new techniques, process, materials, product ‘end of life’ planning and going way beyond minimum standards.

To us this is much more than a ‘tick box solution in a tender’, it is a real commitment and as such, embedded in our aims, ethos and culture. Then using these skills to help drive this change up and down the supply chain and with our clients bringing greater accountability and transparency in our sector.

We were delighted to add this to our other achievements in the last year around sustainability and contribution to the development of women in business. We were awarded the Platinum EcoVadis medal that puts us in the top 1% for sustainability and won 4 awards: The Successful Women in Business 2019, Socially Minded Award - The World of Difference Award - The International Alliance for Women, in recognition of outstanding contribution to the economic empowerment of women 2019, and finally the global WEConnect Woman’s Business Enterprise of the Year Award 2020 – this was the first time it had ever been won by a business in the UK!"