When you hear the word ecosystem, do you think rain forest or swamp or farm or something to do with the conditions of Mother Earth? Well, I want you to think of it in another context, too. That of economic system, as in human economics. After all, we need healthy economies almost as much as we need a healthy Mother Earth. Think Eco2. We need both to live long, happy, productive lives.
Eco2 is what Shebeezies is all about. This site was born out of the frustrations of watching economies collapse during the financial meltdown, because of rodents companies that got too big to care. Um. Perhaps I’m letting my politics show there. Big isn’t necessarily bad, is it? Maybe the companies did care, but were themselves powerless to stop what their own power began.
A shiny silver lining glittering among the carnage is a sense that where we put our money — where we spend it and where we invest it – can make a big difference. Spending on eco-friendly products and services supplied by indiepreneurs featured here on Shebeezies is a start. Protecting our nest eggs, however, is a much tougher decision.
Slipping our money under our mattresses will neither help create a healthy economy nor help our nest eggs grow. On the other hand, if we continue to feed our 401K’s to the companies that don’t care, nothing will change.
Believe it or not, companies do exist that keep an eye on principles as much as they do the bottom line. The real trick is wading through the knee deep bull on Wall Street to find those companies.
Enter the B Corporation, a system to certify corporations that are Eco2 — healthy for our economy and for Mother Earth’s ecosystem. In order to be a certified B Corporation, a company must:
Meet comprehensive and transparent social and environmental performance standards;
Legally expand the responsibilities of the corporation to include stakeholder interests;
Build collective voice through the power of the unifying B Corporation brand.
Instead of both consumers and investors easily fooled into believing certain companies are greenly responsible by virtue of misleading PR campaigns bought and paid for by said companies, a B Corporation must undergo a thorough certification process, meeting certain social (economic) and environmental (ecosystem) standards.
So, look for the B Corporation symbol when shopping and when investing. And continue to think Eco2
