By Garreth Griffith, Chief Impact Officer at Habito
I’m really proud of our announcement today: Habito is now a certified B Corp. We’ve been recognised as a group of people “using business as a force for good”. More than that, we’ve made a legal commitment to put people and planet on the same level as profit.
To be honest, when I first heard of B Corp certification, I assumed it was more of a marketing thing, where you answer a few questions and get a sticker for your website. Looks good, drives a bit of trust and credibility, but doesn’t really prove anything. When I realised how much hard work it takes to get certified, that’s when I got really interested. Becoming a B Corp is something you truly have to earn.
Climbing Everest
Building a positive impact business is like climbing Mount Everest. It’s tough. It takes 100% commitment, it takes sacrifice and support from a team who are fully bought into the idea. Sure it’s not for the faint-hearted, but it can be done, as thousands of Everest summiteers will tell you.
A full Everest expedition takes around 8 weeks — roughly 1 week to reach basecamp, then 7 more weeks to reach the summit. We’re honoured to achieve B Corp certification, but B Corp isn’t the end of our journey. We’re only at basecamp. And we still have the toughest climbs ahead.
How we’re measuring impact
Here’s how we’re measuring our impact on society and the environment at Habito.
We’ve split our impact efforts into two categories:
- A better Habito: weaving a focus on Impact into everyday activities, like recycling, energy use, fair pay, and diversity and inclusion. We’re calling these ‘hygiene’ changes — they’re things we believe every company should be doing.
- A better world: driving a positive change beyond our company, for our customers and out into the world. We’re creating Impact Business Models (IBMs) to support this work.
We’re making good progress on our hygiene changes, and taking every lesson we can from lockdown to help us improve our carbon footprint and more.
We’re at the early stages of our IBM development, researching the areas where we can make the biggest difference.
As a start, we’ve put together working groups, made up of people across all of Habito, to tackle four areas:
- Make homes more sustainable — home heating is one of the biggest contributors to carbon emissions in the UK
- Improve financial literacy — 90% of UK consumers believe they have low financial literacy
- Help new movers feel at home faster — to help people find what’s important to them in their new community, and feel like part of the community sooner
- End homelessness — we’re developing our partnerships and campaigns around this vital cause
I’m delighted to be taking on the role of Chief Impact Officer, a new position we’ve created at Habito to keep us true to our ambitions and guide our impact work. We’ve formed a new Impact Committee to oversee this work, and report back to the Board and Executive Committee on how we’re doing.
Thanks B Lab & Habito
I want to say thanks to B Lab for recognising our efforts so far, and opening the door to the inspiring B Corp community.
And thank you Habito: not just for helping us get to basecamp, but for your support with the rest of the climb. Onwards and upwards!
