We have some great info about this organic brewery from Berkeley, California and all of their efforts to create the most sustainable and green brews out there. We applaud their work and congratulate them on winning a Good Food award for their Gingerbread Ale...
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Bison was recently the first brewery welcomed into the B Corporation line-up of businesses that are dedicated to operating under the highest social and environmental standards. The certification process measures a company’s impact on its employees, suppliers, community, and the environment. Beyond Bison’s organic commitment, the company’s socially responsible behaviors include:
· sourcing only recycled paperboard 6-packs
· studying its carbon footprint
· paying a living wage
· a significant amount of charitable giving
Along with the B Corp certification, owner Daniel Del Grande also recently accepted a “Good Food” award for his Gingerbread Ale, and award sponsored by Whole Foods & San Francisco Magazine, which recognizes and praises some of the same practices the B Corp certification does.
Bison also offers a quick and easy way for their customers to get involved in the environmental cause through a program on their website. The program, called “Drink Neutral”, compliments Bison’s commitment to making a sustainable everyday product to help people implement being “green” into their regular habits by helping to off-set their carbon footprints. Bison proves that one need not sacrifice the pleasures of everyday living to be green. Bison is currently distributed in 16 states across the US, including California, Oregon, both Carolinas, Georgia, Virginia, Florida, Ohio, Colorado, Arizona, Hawaii, and Indiana.
Below is the official press release for Bison and Del Grande’s recent award wins and how he’s working to make a small craft brewery make a big difference in the way businesses are ran and the way products are produced."
Bison Organic Beer joins B Corporation sustainability leaders
Berkeley’s award-winning brewer recognized for organic practices
and social responsibility
BERKELEY, CALIF. (January 21, 2011) — Bison Organic Beer Owner Daniel Del Grande believes that a beer company can make a far-reaching and profound positive impact in the world. That belief runs through every facet of the way Del Grande operates his Berkeley-based brewing company — from choices of beer packaging and brewing location to selection of ingredients and hiring practices — and has resulted in Bison Organic Beer being recognized as a model of sustainability by being certified as a B Corporation.
B Corporation companies are a group of 369 businesses with over $1.8 billion in revenue that are committed to solving social and environmental problems. Through environmental best practices and socially responsible ethics, B Corporation members make a difference by the way they operate their business. Companies who have been B Corporation-certified include Numi Organic Tea and Method Products Inc.
Bison Organic Brewing’s recognition as a B Corporation company is a testament to the brewer’s long-standing belief that brewing world-class beer and building a better world can go hand in hand. Every aspect of the company has been refined, not with the bottom line in mind, but with the goal of enhancing the health of the surrounding society and environment. For example, a recent detailed examination of Bison’s business identified the two single biggest contributors to the brewery’s carbon footprint — agriculture and glass bottle production — reaffirming Del Grande’s commitment to organic agriculture and selling bottled beer only where there is extensive glass recycling. The brewery recently hired three Welfare-to-Work employees and pays a living wage. He brews this organic beer in existing breweries with excess capacity.
Each sustainable practice Bison Brewing adopts has a ripple effect felt far beyond the walls of the beer company — fewer pesticides are sprayed on crops, farmland erosion is minimized, government unemployment and Welfare costs drop, and the local community is strengthened by quality jobs.
“When you look at what Bison Brewing is doing just on the organic side, there are hundreds and hundreds of acres of agriculture that have been converted from non-organic to organic farmland just because of Bison Organic Beer,” said Del Grande. “The same can be said of other portions of our business — the way we operate impacts the community and world in a way that we are very proud of.”
‘Buycotting’
Bison Brewing has been organic since 2003, long before the B Corporation designation existed. But a growing awareness of social responsibility in the business world has recently earned Bison formal recognition and award for its environmental efforts.
Meanwhile U.S. consumers are becoming more aware of the role they play in the social responsibility equation. “Buycotting” turns the idea of boycotting on its head by encouraging discerning consumers to seek out food and beverages that are produced responsibly and ethically. With a wider range of products to choose from than perhaps any other point in U.S. history, a growing number of today’s consumers are voting with their dollars and endorsing businesses that not only produce delicious food and beverages, but also improve the society and environment that consumers and corporations share.
A Time Magazine article named the growing consumer consciousness the “Responsibility Revolution,” and an accompanying poll found that found that 82 percent of those polled consciously supported a local or neighborhood business, while nearly 40 percent said they purchased a product in 2009 because they liked the social or political values of the company that produced it. More than 60 percent of Americans bought organic products, the poll found.
“Consumers know that if they choose organic beer that they too are supporting organic agriculture,” said Del Grande. “When consumers buy Bison Organic Beer, they are also supporting a living wage, and a company committed to minimizing its carbon footprint.”
The praise that Bison Organic Beer has received for its social and environmental practices, however, should not overshadow what made the Berkeley brewer popular in the first place — its expertly brewed, palate-pleasing array of unique craft beers.
Del Grande accepted a “Good Food Award” — a recognition sponsored by Whole Foods and San Francisco Magazine among others — in January for his Gingerbread Ale. The award “celebrates the kind of food we all want to eat: tasty, authentic and responsibly produced,” and is only the most recent in a consistent stream of praise that Bison Organic Beer has collected from prestigious beer festivals across the country.
From smooth Chocolate Stouts to a unique Honey Basil Ale and the complex Barleywine Ale, Bison’s ability to expertly balance creative ingredients into smooth, delicate and flavorful beer has earned it medals from top beer reviewers, including judges at the Great American Beer Festival.
