We spoke to Molly Freshwater and Harriet Mears, the Founder and Creative Director of Secret Linen Store. Sisters with over 30 years of combined experience in high street retail, they created the Secret Linen Store to offer beautiful, high-quality bed linen at fair prices, ensuring honesty and transparency for customers and suppliers. They’ve recently achieved B-corp status.
What does sustainability mean to you?
Sustainability to us is the goal for continued improvement against the impacts we make. Not just focusing on reducing our environmental impact but also our social and governance. We know our responsibility as a business is to look after our people and the planet.
What motivated your company to pursue B Corp Certification?
The B Corp movement aligned perfectly with our values of always seeking to do better and being accountable for our actions. It gave us a compass and comprehensive tool that allowed us to measure our social and environmental performance.
What resources were helpful?
B Corp offer a wide range of guides, toolkits, workshops and webinars to help companies navigate the certification process. The B Impact Assessment is a free online tool that companies can use to assess and improve their social and environmental impacts, before jumping into the application for B Corp certification.
What changes did the company have to make to meet B Corp standards / challenges faced?
The process allowed us to evaluate our business, from our supply chain practices to our employee benefits, through the lens of social and environmental impact. This revealed areas where we excelled and areas for improvement, and provided a structured framework for reporting across different areas of the business, including governance, workers, community, and environment.
How has it impacted company operations and culture?
From the outset, our values were in harmony with the B Corp movement, verifying our commitment to responsible sourcing, making a business that prioritises and takes care of the planet, our people, and our wonderful supply chain. The B Impact Assessment helped us develop sustainability strategies and implement best practices.
Advice for other companies looking to pursue B Corp:
If your ethos is that business could be a force for good, then this is the journey for you. It is more than just earning a certification; it’s a commitment to social and environmental responsibilities. The moment we became a B Corp was a moment of triumph. We joined a global community, united in our mission to use business as a force for good and we are excited to watch the community grow.Don’t hesitate to get in touch with the B Corp community to learn from their experiences and best practices. After all, the B Corp movement is a collective effort to tackle society’s most critical challenges.
