A Merry B-Corp Christmas!

When I was teaching Ethics and Public Policy, I always assigned an article that described a very ethical corporation. Paid employees well, on-site day care, paid suppliers promptly, were good citizens of the community, good benefits program, and opportunities for promotion.  The only fly in the ointment was the company’s product. They produced instruments of torture. The moral of the story, like Tom Lehrer’s satirical song The Old Drug Peddler, is that one should do well by doing good.

Corporations want to be people in some ways and not others. Bankruptcy is easier for them than actual humans with burdens of medical or student loan debt. They pay lower taxes and extract all kinds of goodies from local governments hungry for jobs. One of the ways in which they are not like people is a lack of consequences for many of their antisocial actions. B-corporations are a partial answer to that question. (The B stands for benefit.)

B-corporations have corporate charters that make them accountable to all their stakeholders, not just their stockholders. Suppliers, customers, employees, the community, the environment. But they also should have an obligation that is not often included in corporate charters: to produce goods and services that are useful and do as little harm as possible.  So, I was delighted to find a B-corporation online that was offering a product that met both criteria. I can’t be too specific because I bought it for one of my blog followers. Let’s just say that it should contribute to the health of a member of my family by addressing certain allergies.

The last few Christmases have awakened my inner B-corporation. I want to have a good Christmas while doing good. Donations have always been part of our family Christmas for the past ten years, as well as reconnecting with friends and including strays where we can. Everyone gets to spend $30 on my credit card to support a project of Global Giving, ranging from tree planting to refugee relief to protecting endangered species. We also give a turkey to our local food bank and seek out other options for sharing. We enjoy the lights on homes and city streets and make our house festive with the ornaments and Santas that emerge from eleven months under the bed and in the closet.

We have cut back on the number of gifts in our family of twelve. No, I did not have ten children; that would be wildly irresponsible and not conducive to having a professional career! The family consists of me, three daughters, three sons-in-law, four granddaughters and one grandson-in-law. Everyone gets two gifts and gives two gifts. At the behest of my oldest daughter, we emphasize giving experiences and consumables—tickets to plays, movie gift cards, edibles. (I give a lot of books, but I consider them consumable, as I expect most of them will eventually wind up in a library or a yard sale or a friend’s house.)  We play family games while my sons-in-law fill in for my late husband by making minor household repairs, and usually go to a movie together.  An artificial tree serves from year to year, leaving a real tree to grow, absorb carbon dioxide, and provide shelter for wildlife. Preparing our Christmas feast is a joint effort, supplemented by snack foods I only make once a year—sausage balls, Hershey kisses wrapped in chocolate cookie dough, miniature cheesecakes, scones. Daughters and granddaughters do some cookie baking.

Each year there is something new along with all the old familiars.  One COVID Zoom Christmas featured a reading of Dylan Thomas’s A Child’s Christmas in Wales. This year’s innovation for me is finding a B-corporation offering a useful and consumable product.  What will your Christmas add to your family traditions this year?