CINCINNATI — The first brewery in Ohio to become B Corp Certified is celebrating the big accomplishment of being so socially and environmentally friendly and is hoping others follow suit.
What You Need To Know
- MadTree is the first brewery in Ohio to become B Corp Certified
- To be B Corp Certified you have to meet the highest standards in environmental and social impact
- MadTree does a lot of things behind the scenes to meet the requirements including composting and requiring all employees to volunteer
- Leaders at the brewery hope to grow the business three times and make $5 million of impact by 2030
It’s all about the beer at MadTree Brewing. For Brittany Frey, the production manager for the brewery, it’s also about being creative and showing off their newer products.
But what makes Frey most proud to work at the popular Cincinnati brewery is the encouragement to get out in the community.
“One of the things I’m most proud of," Frey said. "Obviously I’m very proud of all of our products that we put out but I do hold it to a higher standard that we are also connecting with our community and something that’s bigger than just ourselves and beer.”
In fact, volunteering 16 hours a year is a requirement for every MadTree employee. The Brewery has always held a high standard in giving back and being rooted in purpose- specifically being sustainable. Which is why receiving the news of being B Corp Certified is such a big deal.
“B Corp means your company meets the highest standards in environmental and social impact at its very core," Rhiannon Hoeweler the VP of experience and impact said.
Hoeweler helps coordinate a lot of the volunteer work the employees do throughout the year.
“Volunteer work is really, really important to our company," Hoeweler said. "It’s important to our culture, it’s how we attract talent, it’s how we retain talent… it kind of fulfills a lot of what we are as MadTree. Our purpose is to connect people to nature and each other and we fulfill that through our community work.”
Through the community and sustainability work- like donating one percent of profits to environmental nonprofits in the community, or composting and being as close to zero waste as possible, the brewery was named the first in the state to be B Corp Certified.
“We are bigger than beer is what we say," Hoeweler said. "Everyone pitches in, right? Because our entire team is doing volunteer hours. Like our entire company is part of this certification, so it’s a really big deal.
These leaders won’t stop here- the company has lofty goals of growing by three times and having $5 million of impact by 2030. They just hope their initiatives will encourage other businesses to follow in their footsteps.
“It’s been a to of work to get to that certification but I think it kind of just shows us that we are on the right path," Frey said. "That our employees are passionate to continue growing within that certification, we’re not just going to pause where we are, we’re going to continue building.”