Hailing from a single store in Vermont, created by two men making ice-cream, Ben & Jerry's has rapidly become a truly global company, employing 514 people in the US alone, and operating 550 small ‘Scoop Shops' spread across the US and 23 other countries across the world. By their own admission, Ben & Jerry's Homemade Ice Cream Inc. see themselves as a “values led business”, rather than by financial and business circumstances. The company aims to do more than just maximize profits as a business; and focuses “to make the world a better place”. (www.benandjerrys.co.uk). Ben & Jerry's would have the consumer believe that as a socially and ecologically responsible firm, its ‘duty' is to respect the environment in which it resides and trades. This environmental report aims to discuss, analyze and evaluate the effectiveness of Ben and Jerry's sustainable practices. Also, the report will consider whether the company achieves its own directive of enhancing the world through socially responsible conduct.
[...] Their efforts to achieve this have consisted of reducing their use of operational resources such as transport, and instead opting to source the raw materials necessary for their ice creams from areas local to Ben & Jerry's' manufacturing plants. Moreover, Ben & Jerry's have attempted to source much of their European ice creams from a Dutch factory that only uses renewable energy sources. This factory is to date the only carbon neutral manufacturer in The Netherlands. Finally, Ben & Jerry's offset their predicted annual emissions by purchasing ‘carbon credits' that enable the foundation called Gold Standard to invest money in environmental projects. [...]
[...] In doing so they are confronting a critical contemporary issue, as “conservation not only saves money and prevents degradation of the environment; it helps prevent future crises.” (Gair, 2001.) Although the company has had criticisms from various sources, one in particular by local American press criticising the waste ice-cream that is fed to pigs in a local farm, Ben & Jerry's have managed to create an environmental policy that is of a competitively high standard. It is debatable whether feeding ice cream to pigs has any health effects on the animal, and on face value seems to be an effective method of utilising the waste produce. [...]
[...] For example, the Chinese ministry of commerce (MOFCOM) criticised Haagen Dazs individually for “neglecting their social responsibility, and doing something in violation of social responsibility and moral code." (www.chinacsr.com) Fair Trade Produce Ben & Jerry's claim to be the first international ice cream maker to sell products made with ingredients solely coming from fair trade suppliers. Recently, the company developed a partnership with the famous Max Havelaar Association, and their new vanilla ice cream is the product to be Max Havelaar accredited in Europe. [...]
[...] From the perspective of energy use and conservation, Ben & Jerry's is a company defiant on minimising their “negative impact on the environment” (www.benandjerrys.com) With evidence from their CSR report of 2006 showing that Ben & Jerry's are committed to reducing their energy usage, it is possible to see that they are acting effectively. From an article written by Danielle Miller Wagner, she states three steps are needed in order to dramatically increase an organisations energy economy. Fundamentally, these steps correspond extremely closely with Ben & Jerry's' Energy Saving projects. [...]
[...] For example, in 1995, when the preservation of the rainforests was a hot topic, Ben & Jerry's decided to create a new product (Rainforest Crunch Ice Cream) that contained nut products from the Amazon rainforest. However, as previously discussed this was not as successful as hoped. Other more successful products have included fair trade range, as discussed overleaf. The company also operates schemes such as ‘gift matching' in which they match any donations to charitable causes made by an employee. [...]
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