Burt’s Bees
The company I chose to research is Burt’s Bees. Founded in 1984, this company has held the highest standard for what is considered natural products. Burt’s Bees prides itself on selling “Earth friendly” products and has shaped the standard for other companies who sell natural products.
This company’s main social good initiative is The Burt’s Bees Greater Good Foundation. The goal for this non-profit program is to help sustain other initiatives like rafi, an organization that helps support environmentally friendly farms, and Habitat for Humanity, an organization that helps to house impoverished families. The Burt’s Bees Greater Good Foundation uses big data to find the non-profits that contribute the most to supporting humans and honeybees. However, I do not know exactly what big data they are collecting to make these decisions. The information I have found is very nonspecific, but I would guess they look at the impact each company has on the community. Foundations like this often look for partners with the same ideals that they themselves hold. On their website, Burt’s Bees highlights their sustainability report, which catalogs the ways that the company is working to be more energy efficient and environmentally friendly. They probably look at the sustainability report for their potential partners to see what strides they are making toward the same goal. I am sure they also assess the success of the company and the public opinion of the the company.
Over all, this business dedicates more than half of its’ operations to the public good. Burt’s Bees is all about social good. Their products are a natural alternative to chemically based products. They try to make their operation as energy efficient as possible, so their impact on the environment is as low as possible. Since a good amount of their products have honey as a base, the company has also started the Bring Back the Bees program. This program is dedicated to the cultivation of flowers that bees are partial to. Giving bees the opportunity to create new colonies by expanding their habitat will give them a chance to rebuild their populations. Programs like this greatly benefit the company, not just the environment, because adding to the bee population helps the company profit from the honey that is produced by the bees. If the bee population continues to decline, their business will also decline from loosing products.
To find out more information about this company and see where I got my information visit this website:
Previous Post
Next Post
Its so interesting that you did you article on hurts bees, we discussed their organizational structure in one of my earlier classes. We smoke about how the brand somewhat transformed to fit the characteristics of the publics request. For instance the company went toward more eco friendly based packaging in the past 10 years or so at the request of the consumers. This is one company that has really structured its brand around market data, and I can only assume that big data had a role to play.
Spoke*
I also found Bert’s Bees to be a really interesting company to research. They take corporate responsibility to a whole new level because not only do they strive to be socially responsible, but they are also incredibly environmentally friendly. Obviously, bees are crucial to our ecosystem and the fact that Bert’s Bees is home to so many hives, taking excellent care of them, and spreading education is really incredible.
This post is especially relevant given the bee crisis. I recently saw a list of all the products we consume that are made from bees, and that list is so much longer than just honey. Bees are definitely something that I would say are included in the realm of public good because we all benefit from the work of bees even if only a few companies / individuals are actively working and contributing to keeping them alive and thriving. It’s also really cool that Burt’s Bees contributes money to Habitat for Humanity and Rafi. It would be interesting to know what data they collect and what it could be used for. For example, I wonder how many people who buy their products also volunteer for Habitat or Rafi or another volunteer organization.
I really liked this post, and I find it really interesting that the company has to rely on bees in order to prosper, which in turn helps the environment and hopefully allows for the greater care of bees. I am curious to know what data they collect and how they use it to further their cause, but it does seem like they do a lot of good with the data that they receive. Great post!