A B Corp company - 6 months on
In September 2023, we were delighted to receive accreditation as a B Corp company with a high-flying B Impact Assessment score of 83.
Accreditation was only the start, however, and as one of over 6,000 B Corp companies dedicated to meeting and exceeding rigorous social and environmental standards, we still have so much to achieve. Our ongoing aims are to continually improve our sustainable, transparent, and accountable business model, and to demonstrate – alongside our fellow Travel by B Corp companies - how tourism, when founded on ethical principles and guided by a thoughtful approach, can be a force for good.
Here below is a summary of some of the projects we’ll be rolling out over the course of 2024:
Our Carbon Impact
In 2023, we trialled hybrid and electric vehicles with members of our local teams, and we are now analysing the future of this moving forward. We will continue to monitor the carbon emissions per full-time employee and we will be looking at how we can measure our scope 3 carbon emissions (indirect value chain emissions), with the aim of reducing these wherever possible.
Our Team
For 2024, we are encouraging each member of our team to take two extra day’s paid leave so that they can volunteer for environmental/sustainability projects in our destinations, in their own communities or further afield.
Our Villas
Our clients are making more informed decisions when choosing their villas, and the aspect of sustainability is increasing in importance.
We will also continue rolling out our sustainability survey (piloted in 2023) to our owners to understand how their villas can be developed to become more environmentally friendly. This will allow us to champion properties with significant ecological credentials (of which there are already a considerable number) and to incorporate what we learn into the way we curate our collection and onboard new properties.
Our Supply Chain
We work with suppliers who demonstrate good social, environmental and working practices, and we prioritise suppliers who are local to our destinations. Our suppliers are already required to sign contracts which include an Anti-Bribery and Modern Slavery clause. We also request Environmental, Social and Corporate Governance (ESG) standards when contracting new companies to ensure they meet our high ESG standards and that they share a common approach to business.
In 2023, we introduced a preferable purchasing policy, ensuring environmental and social responsibility when planning both purchases and when contracting with suppliers, and already at the beginning of 2024 we have strengthened this aspect of the way we do business, ensuring a focus on local, like-minded companies.
Local Communities
We will be working ever more closely with the Conservation Collective (and especially with the Sicily Environment Fund – on whose steering committee our founders and some of our owners sit) by embracing many of their local projects.
We will continue to plan menus with our in-villa chefs that are more sustainable, and in line with, for example, the ‘pick the alien’ project (promoting the consumption of invasive fish species so as to reduce the consumption of native species). We will also help to raise awareness about the threat to posidonia (fields of sea grass on the ocean bed) and encourage our clients to become involved in ongoing ecological projects during their Thinking Traveller stay.
Last but not least, we will continue to promote our Community Charity Policy, a staff-led initiative through which we raise money and awareness for deserving charities in the communities where our offices are located in London and Athens.
