The FruitGuys Awarded B Corp Best for the World

By Pia Hinckle
July 13, 2022
Reading Time: 3 mins.

The FruitGuys has been named a 2022 Best for the World™ B Corp™ in recognition of its exceptional positive impact in the Community category. Best for the World is a distinction granted to Certified B Corporations (B Corps) whose impact scores rank in the top 5% of all B Corps in their corresponding size group.

The FruitGuys earned this honor because of its initiatives to:

Create healthier offices, homes, schools
Support small American farms
Fight hunger

The FruitGuys donates a minimum value of 20% of its annual profits through weekly produce donations from its facilities to hunger relief organizations nationwide; and annual grants for environmental stewardship to small farms via our non-profit, The FruitGuys Community Fund. The FruitGuys became B Corp certified in 2019. Read our 2021 Impact Report.

Woman farmer at Red H Farm, a community fund 2022 grantee, harvesting potatoes — Red H Farm in Sebastopol, CA is a 2022 FruitGuys Community Fund grantee. They will use their $5,000 grant to expand their drip irrigation system, establish perennial edible and pollinator-focused hedgerows, and build a caterpillar tunnel.

Helping small farms with sustainability grants and fighting hunger by donating fruit to those in need are the two core impact components that have been built into our business model,” said Chris Mittelstaedt, Founder and CEO of The FruitGuys.
“We are honored by the recognition from B-Lab as one of their Best for the World awardees. This achievement would not be possible without our clients, team members, farm and community partners. Thank you.”

Fruitguys hunger relief partner Lovin Spoonfuls in Boston receives donated fruit.

What’s a B Corp?

B Corp is a for-profit business that meets the highest standards of independently-verified social and environmental performance, public transparency, and accountability. B Lab verifies and certifies the five impact areas evaluated in the B Impact Assessment — community, customers, environment, governance, and workers — required for certification.

Every year, Best for the World recognizes the top-performing B Corps creating the greatest positive impact through their businesses. It provides an opportunity for recognized companies to share knowledge, learnings, and best practices with the business community to encourage innovation and transformation. The full lists of companies awarded are available at bcorporation.net.

Best for the World

The Best for the World recognition is administered by B Lab, the global nonprofit network that certifies and mobilizes B Corps. Today, there are more than 5,000 B Corps across 80 countries and 155 industries, unified by one common goal: building an inclusive, equitable, and regenerative economic system.

“Each Best for the World edition is an opportunity to raise the bar for how businesses can and should operate to create real and lasting positive impact for their workers, customers, communities, and the environment,” said Dan Osusky, Head of Standards and Insights at B Lab Global. “While no company is perfect and even the best companies can and should continue to strive to improve, the B Corps recognized as Best for the World can provide us all — standards setters, B Corps, non B Corps, and sustainability advocates — with inspiration on what true leadership in business can look like to make progress on addressing our current global challenges.”

About B Corp Certification
B Corp Certification doesn’t just evaluate a product or service, it assesses the overall social and environmental impact of the company that stands behind it. To achieve B Corp Certification, a company must meet a score of at least 80 points on the B Impact Assessment, an evaluation of a company’s positive impact, and pass a risk review, an evaluation of a company’s negative impact; change their corporate governance structure to be accountable to all stakeholders, not just shareholders; and exhibit transparency by allowing information about their B Corp Certification performance to be publicly available on their B Corp profile on B Lab’s website.

B Lab aims to transform the global economy to benefit all people, communities, and the planet. Their global network creates standards, policies, tools, and programs for businesses. B Lab has created and led efforts to pass over 50 corporate statutes globally that enable stakeholder governance, with over 10,000 companies using the legal framework. The B Lab community includes 400,000 workers in over 5,000 B Corps across 80 countries and 155 industries. To learn more and join the movement, visit www.bcorporation.net.