FAQs

The development of the standards for B Corp Certification are overseen by B Lab's independent Standards Advisory Council.

B Corp Certification is administered by B Lab Global.

There are currently over 8200 Certified B Corporations across over 160 industries in more than 96 countries.

Probably! There are Certified B Corps in more than 50 countries around the world. Use our B Corp Directory to search by keyword, location, or industry.

B Corp is a certification. Benefit Corporation is a legal form.

Benefit Corporations and Certified B Corporations are often confused. The B Corp Certification is a third-party certification administered by the non-profit B Lab, based in part on a company's verified performance on the B Impact Assessment. The Benefit Corporation is a legal structure for a business, which exists in 34 states across USA, Italy and Colombia. Benefit Corporations are legally empowered to pursue positive stakeholder impact alongside profit. Some companies are both Certified B Corporations and Benefit Corporations, and the Benefit Corporation structure fulfills the legal accountability requirement of B Corp Certification. Learn more about the UK legal requirement.

We’re different, but highly aligned. B Corps are for-profit businesses that have made a commitment to create a material positive impact on society and the environment through their operations. Companies certify as a B Corps by earning points on the B Impact Assessment relating to how they do business and whether their business model addresses a particular social or environmental need, and have their score independently verified by B Lab.

In the UK, we are fortunate to have a developed concept of a social enterprise and an active community of businesses who are focused on achieving better outcomes in social and environmental areas. For further details on the criteria to meet the UK social enterprise definition, including the required use of profits and asset locks, see the SEUK website.

Whilst there are some social enterprises that also certify as B Corps, the majority of B Corps in the UK would not self-classify as social enterprises under the UK definition. B Lab’s focus is building on the powerful examples of social enterprises and extending it to support mainstream businesses that give the same rigour to their social and environmental impact as they do to their financial returns. We see this as a great opportunity to make a difference at scale and by doing so, to reinvent the role of business in society.

Yes! Existing global Certified B Corps have gone public, and publicly-traded companies, such as Natura, have also achieved B Corp Certification.  Many other Certified B Corps are subsidiaries of publicly-traded companies, such as Graze and Sundial Brands (owned by Unilever) and Ella’s Kitchen UK (owned by Hain Celestial Group). In November 2021 we welcomed Kin & Carta, listed on the London Stock Exchange, to the B Corp community in the UK!

B Corp Certification isn't a perfect fit for every organisation. Nonprofits, large multinationals, governmental organisations and companies of all sectors and sizes can get involved in the B Corp Movement by using B Lab's impact management and stakeholder governance tools.

As more companies apply for B Corp Certification, B Lab and its Standards Advisory Council must develop models for how to effectively evaluate the impacts of many different industries, policies and practices. As part of your assessment, you will be asked to complete the Disclosure Questionnaire; the final series of questions your company will answer in the B Impact Assessment.

While B Corp Certification is primarily based on assessing a business' positive impact, material negative impacts are also considered through the Disclosure Questionnaire, background checks, and a public complaint process. The Disclosure Questionnaire allows the company to confidentially disclose to B Lab any sensitive practices, fines, and sanctions related to the company or its partners. Responses to the Disclosure Questionnaire do not affect a company’s numerical score on the B Impact Assessment but can ultimately affect its eligibility for certification.

Typically, the majority of these responses are minor in nature and therefore no further action is needed. However, if B Lab identifies one or more items in the Disclosure Questionnaire or in a background check of a company and its senior management to be material, it may merit further transparency, and the company will be notified to provide incremental disclosure of relevant information. In certain cases, the company will be required to implement specific remedies to obtain or maintain their B Corp certification. In rare cases the company's certification will be denied or revoked. You can read more on the global controversial issues page.

Acceptance into and continued participation in the B Corp community is at the sole discretion of the Standards Advisory Council and B Lab's Board of Directors.

Yes! You can search for open positions at B Corporations using B Work, the world's largest impact jobs board.

There is no minimum or maximum size for a company to certify. Certain companies, such as those under a year old, those with related entities, or large multinational and public companies, have additional considerations and requirements.

Subsidiaries, franchises, and companies with related entities may pursue B Corp Certification, with certain limits. Subsidiaries of publicly-traded companies also must meet additional transparency requirements.

B Corp Certification is based in part on a company's verified performance on the B Impact Assessment, which asks questions about a company's past fiscal year. This means that companies with less than one year of operations are not yet eligible for B Corp Certification. Instead, they may pursue Pending B Corp status, designed to set a start-up on the path to full Certification.

Throughout the certification process, companies are required to:

1. Achieve a score of at least 80 points on the B Impact Assessment and submit it for review. The assessment is verified by independent analysts at B Lab Global and companies will be asked to provide documentation and other evidence to support and verify answers. 
2. Meet the B Corp Legal requirement to amend the company’s Articles of Association, making a commitment to consider all stakeholders in the company's decision-making, not just shareholders. 
3. Pay the company fees outlined on the pricing page to become a B Corp, based on a company’s revenue.

Yes! There's no minimum size for B Corp Certification. Your company size will influence the questions you have to answer on the B Impact Assessment to meet the performance requirement for Certification. 

Companies and other business forms wishing to become B Corps in the UK must meet a legal accountability requirement to maintain their certification, and will need to amend their governing documents to include a commitment to a ‘triple bottom line’ approach to business. In practice, for a typical business, this means amending the company’s Articles of Association to state that the company exists to promote the success of the business for the benefit not only of its shareholders, but also to have a material positive impact on society and the environment.

The governing documents of B Corps will need to state the company’s commitment to consider a range of ‘stakeholder interests’ – including shareholders, employees, suppliers, society and the environment – when making decisions and, critically, that shareholder value is not the supreme consideration but is one factor amongst the many stakeholder interests.

Your company's legal requirement will vary based on your location and structure. For companies looking to certify as a B Corp in the UK, this guide outlines the steps for amending your governing documents to include the B Corp legal language.  You can also read more here.

All B Corps and Pending B Corps are required to amend their constitutional documents to include the B Corp legal language. Companies with 0-49 employees should seek to meet the B Corp legal requirement before or as part of their certification.

We appreciate that this can be a time-consuming process, and there are some exceptions for larger companies that may require more time to complete the necessary approvals. If you are unsure about the appropriate approach for your organisation, read more here or contact us.

All B Corps are required to recertify every three years.

We kindly ask companies not to use the B Corp logo on their marketing materials or products until they have finalised their B Corp Certification. Please note that the Pending B Corp logo is specifically for start-up companies that have less than 12 months of operations, and cannot be used by companies awaiting their verification.

When big businesses show leadership on positive social and environmental performance, and take steps to minimise their negative impacts, they are working not only to improve their own practices, but to drive economic systems change at scale. 

B Corps being acquired is an opportunity for that company to scale their impact and have a positive influence on parent companies who may then choose to commit to certification or adopt sustainability practices from the acquired subsidiary or brand. B Corp Certification is designed both to discourage greenwashing and to incentivise this kind of positive influence.

If a B Corp is acquired, it will need to notify B Lab of its intent to stay in the B Corp community within 90 days. 

The B Corp will then need to recertify within a year of the acquisition, or by the end of its three-year recertification term depending on which is sooner, to ensure the company continues to meet the standard for B Corp Certification under new ownership. For larger, more complex entities, this period is extended to two years.

In order for the company to maintain certification independent of its corporate parent, it will need to meet B Lab’s assessment criteria and determine that it is complete and distinct; that is, a legal entity that is able to control its impact and meet the B Corp Legal Requirement. The intent of this is to ensure companies have control over their products and services and function as a ‘complete’ business, with executive accountability and management over the core day to day operations.

These are the five criteria a company must meet to be able to certify independently: 

• Operational for longer than 12 months
• Is a for-profit company (not just a brand or division)
• Is able to meet the B Corp Legal Requirement
• Meets B Lab’s standards on any controversial industries that the company is involved in
• Meets B Lab’s complete and distinct criteria
• If a company does not meet all of the complete and distinct criteria, it is likely that it will be ineligible for B Corp Certification at the requested level (i.e. subsidiary level) and the scope would need to be expanded

B Corp subsidiaries may also need to meet an additional transparency requirement, listing their full B Impact Assessment on their B Corp profile. For a deeper dive on complex structures and what it means for B Corp Certification, click here. 

If a B Corp does not meet B Lab’s assessment criteria (listed above), it cannot recertify independently of its corporate parent or related affiliate entities. This means that the parent company should start its own B Corp Certification process and include the initial B Corp as a subsidiary or brand within its certification scope. 

In cases where the parent company is already a B Corp or commits to achieving certification within a year, the subsidiary will not be required to recertify.

To certify as a B Corp, businesses make a legal change (also known as a 'mission lock'), updating their Articles of Association so that the business exists to benefit all stakeholders — customers, communities, workers, environment — not just shareholders. In the event of an acquisition, the mission lock protects a B Corp's commitment to aligning the interests of all stakeholders.

In addition, B Corps must recertify every 3 years, completing the rigorous B Impact Assessment and third party verification process to ensure it is continuing to measure and manage its social and environmental performance and meeting the required standards. If a B Corp is acquired or undergoes a significant change in control, it is also required to recertify within a year (two years for larger, more complex entities) to have its operations assessed under new ownership. There’s also an additional transparency requirement for wholly owned subsidiaries — they have to have their full assessment visible on our website. 

Verification is the second stage of the B Corp Certification review process. 

After a company has submitted their B Impact Assessment and one of our analysts has determined they are eligible for B Corp Certification at the Evaluation stage, they enter Verification. This is where the company’s B Impact Assessment is analysed alongside their Disclosure Questionnaire and other supporting documentation. Verification can take several months depending on the company’s size and complexity, so it is important that we charge a verification fee upfront and that our pricing more closely reflects the true cost of this stage of the process.

Ineligibility is not related to a company’s performance in the B Impact Assessment. B Corp certification is available to for-profit companies that operate in a competitive marketplace. Therefore certain organisations, like charities who do not trade to earn income, are not eligible to be certified B Corporations. Additionally, if a company is a subsidiary of a larger business sharing a common brand, or trading from the same legal entity, in some instances it may not be eligible to become a certified B Corporation independently of its parent or the wider group. These issues should be considered as early as possible, please contact us if this applies to your business.

Please select the country where the majority of your employees operate. If your company's structure is large or complex, we strongly recommend that you get in touch with us so we can help you determine the right certification approach.

B Lab recognises that measuring environmental impact will look different in different companies. The majority of the topics assessed in the Environment section (such as energy usage or travel) still apply for virtual businesses. It might be difficult to collate this information if your employees work from home, or in a shared office space. However, the intent is to meaningfully measure and assess the impact of the space your employees use regardless of whether they are company sanctioned or not.

We typically recommend answering affirmatively to questions that are true for a majority of your employees. For example, if a majority of your employees recycle at home, please select “Yes” for that question. You could also ask your workers to report on their monthly energy and water usage and take an average across your employees.

Yes - you will receive questions that are tailored to the size (number of employees) and type (sector) of business when you register on the B Impact Assessment. Please indicate the appropriate number of employees at this time, so that we can provide you with the most appropriate assessment.  

We encourage companies to involve anyone that is interested, regardless of their title or time with the company. We recommend appointing one person as a lead; this individual typically completes a first draft of the assessment and then convenes a supporting team to assist. The size and composition of the team may vary depending on the size and structure of your company, however the most common profiles include CEOs, CFOs, HR Managers, COOs, Finance, Sustainability, Supply Chain, Procurement, and Interns.

The past twelve months or trailing twelve months is the recommended reporting period. We recommend using the 12-month period that most closely reflects the company’s operations as of today but is easy for your company to report consistently on. As a result, if using the last Fiscal Year is easier, we would encourage your company to use this period. Find out more on reporting periods.

The B Impact Assessment examines a company's impact on their workers, community, environment, and customers. The BIA also asks questions about a company's governance structure and accountability. Questions are split into two categories: Operations, which covers a company's day-to-day activities, and Impact Business Models, which awards additional points for business models designed to create additional positive impact. The B Impact Assessment is updated every year to incorporate feedback and improve upon the standards. Learn more about the performance requirements for Certification.

There are a number of different ways you can access support with the B Impact Assessment:

• The Improvement Report on the B Impact Assessment is a valuable tool and you can find out how it works here. The Improvement Report provides recommendations for how to improve your impact based on your current responses to specific questions on the assessment. Many companies actively use this as an improvement tool to increase their score over time.
   

• The Knowledge Base hosts useful articles to guide businesses through the assessment and certification process.
   

• If you require hands-on support to improve your score, B Lab UK trains experienced sustainability professionals in the B Corp certification process and impact measurement framework. These ‘B Leaders’ form a group of external consultants that can support companies through their certification. There are costs to working with these consultants but if that is of interest, you can find out more about B Leaders here and search, filter and contact those consultants that may be most appropriate for you

The time involved largely depends on the size and complexity (number of operating locations) of your company. For most small businesses, it can take a couple of weeks to complete a rough baseline. For larger or more complex companies, it can take several weeks or months. For your convenience, the assessment can be saved and revisited at any time to allow for easy access. The time it takes for a company to submit its application will depend on its initial baseline score and whether a period of improvement is required to reach 80+ points.

For an overview of the current review process timeline in the UK, please visit this page.

To submit your assessment, go into the B Impact Assessment website and navigate to ‘B Corporation Certification’ then ‘Summary’. Here you will see any outstanding actions you need to complete in order to submit. Once the required actions have been completed, the padlock will turn into a submit button. Find out more here.

All of a company’s responses and score reports are strictly confidential.

All employees of B Lab and its network of global affiliates enter into are covered under a company-wide non-disclosure agreement to protect all client and B Impact Assessment user data.

B Lab, its affiliates, or its contractors, may use the information you submit through the B Impact Assessment to develop and validate the assessment.

In the event that you have indicated your affiliation with one of our Standards Partners organisations, B Lab reserves the right to share your information with our Standards Partners (organisations that B Lab has entered into a relationship with in regards to the B Impact Assessment).

We are also able to draft a non-disclosure agreement with your company, please reach out to certification@bcorporation.uk if this is of interest to you.

Company governing documents / Articles of Association can vary in structure and content, therefore there is not one particular section where you must apply the B Corp legal wording. Some companies insert the wording under Director’s Duties, or Company Objects, or at the end of their Articles. The important thing is that the text is adopted verbatim based on the legal structure of your company. If you’d like to see some examples,feel free to use our B Corp directory to browse B Corps in the UK, and look up these companies on Companies House for inspiration about how they have incorporated the legal change into their documentation.

Companies seeking to become Pending B Corps and companies with 0-49 employees are required to make the legal change prior to achieving certification. 

Companies with 50 or more employees are granted extra time post-Certification (up to 1 year) to complete the legal requirement.  

LLPs have up to 90 days after certification to make the legal change. 

Only the board of the parent company making the amendment to their governing documents need to sign the board resolution. The amended Articles of the parent company then cover all wholly-owned subsidiaries. If there are any majority-owned subsidiaries within the group, they would have to meet the B Corp Legal Requirement on their own.

We strongly advise incorporating the wording verbatim based on the guidance available here. Companies that do not think they can adopt the legal path as outlined may provide B Lab with a written letter from an attorney that explains why they are unable to meet the legal requirement, and may include alternative solutions which will be reviewed and either accepted or rejected by B Lab’s Certification & Verification Team and legal committee. However this may result in a longer overall timeline to certification.

Sole traders are eligible to become B Corps, however they are not able to meet the B Corp legal requirement as they do not have governing documents / Articles of Association. If you are a sole trader, you should select Option 1 in the Mission Lock question, worth 2.5 points.

The review process is the process in which your assessment will be verified by B Lab's independent Standards Management Team. You can find out more about the different stages of the review process here.

After you have submitted your assessment, you will enter a review process with B Lab. In the Evaluation stage, an Evaluation Analyst will perform a number of checks to ensure you are eligible for B Corp certification, and are on the right track of the assessment. You will only be contacted directly during this phase if the Evaluation Analyst has any questions or requires some more information from you.

You will then move on to the Verification stage, which usually includes one or more phone calls with a Standards Analyst to discuss any questions that they have about your assessment. This is also when you will be asked to provide additional information and evidence to support your answers as required. You can find information about the entire review process here.

You will only need to produce any documentation if your company chooses to apply for B Corp certification. If your company is simply using the assessment as a benchmarking tool, please ignore this step. The list of documentation requested depends on a company’s specific answers to the B Impact Assessment and is generated after a company initiates the review process with B Lab staff. For example, if the company answered that 35% of its ingredients are from recycled input materials, the company would be expected to show how it arrived at that answer either through a spreadsheet of all ingredients with specific recycled percentages or by submitting specific invoices that detail out ingredient characteristics.

To meet the performance requirement, a company must earn a minimum, verified score of 80 points on the B Impact Assessment (BIA). This can be through a combination of Operations questions and Impact Business Model (IBM) questions.

Operations questions focus on the operational performance of your company as it is managed and operated on a day to day basis, such as providing employee benefits, local purchasing policies, and recycling waste.

Impact Business Models go a level deeper by identifying and evaluating whether and how a company is designed to create specific positive social and / or environmental impact. Examples of IBM practices include poverty alleviation, or creating a fair trade supply chain. This section is a collection of best practices that are extremely rare but are a defining element of a company’s business model. Small elements of IBM type practices are likely mentioned in the other sections, but the IBM section allows the assessment to isolate these big picture goals and evaluate them at a much higher degree of detail.

Find out more about Operations and IBM scoring through the relevant links.

You can check on the status of your assessment at any time in the B Impact Assessment itself, by clicking on the ‘Reviews’ tab from the left-hand menu. Find out more here.

Pending B Corp status is for early stage companies seeking to signal that they are on track to certifying as a B Corp. To be eligible for Pending B Corp status, companies must have been operational for less than 1 year. You can find out more about how we calculate a company’s operational start date here, and the process for becoming a Pending B Corp here.

To become a Pending B Corp, the key requirements are:

• Complete the B Impact Assessment on a prospective basis, estimating what your performance will be once you have been operational for at least 1 year. You don't need to achieve 80 points, the prospective B Impact Assessment does not need to be verified by B Lab, and you will receive no verified score.

• Meet the B Corp Legal requirement to amend your Articles of Association to reflect your company’s commitment to considering all stakeholders as part of its decision-making, not just shareholders. Find out more about meeting the legal requirement.

• Sign the Pending B Corp Agreement and pay a one-time fee of £500 (+ VAT). 

Pending B Corps complete the same version of the B Impact Assessment as all other companies. For B Lab to know that you intend to gain Pending B status, please make sure you accurately specify your company’s operational start date on the Company Details page. To submit your assessment, go into the B Impact Assessment website and navigate to ‘B Corporation Certification’ then ‘Summary’. Here you will see any outstanding actions you need to complete in order to submit. Once the required actions have been completed, the padlock will turn into a submit button. Find out more here.

A company’s Pending B Corp certification lasts for 1 year. After this point, the company will be eligible to apply for full B Corp certification.

Pending B Corp companies are eligible to apply to become a fully Certified B Corp when they have been ‘operational’ for at least 12 months (read B Lab’s definition of ‘operational’ here). As long as you submit your assessment before your Pending B Corp expiry date, your Pending B Corp status will remain active until your verification is complete, and you can continue to use the Pending B Corp logo.

From 1st July 2024 B Lab UK has changed its pricing model. To become a Certified B Corporation, companies must pay a one-off submission and verification fee to certify, followed by an annual fee. You can find out your company fees to become a Certified B Corp using our pricing tool here.

Submission fee

Once your assessment is submitted, a one-off tiered submission fee is payable. This covers the cost of a high-level review of the company’s assessment prior to verification and ensures the company’s commitment to the certification process. 

Verification fee

From 1st July 2024, a one-off tiered verification fee is payable prior to the company having their assessment verified. This fee enables B Lab to keep up with growing demand and momentum of the movement, while maintaining the rigour of our verification process and evolving our standards. 

Annual fee

For B Corps, annual fees are based on a company’s total revenue on the last set of audited accounts.

Pending B Corps

Pending B Corps only pay a one-time fee of £500 (+ VAT), which covers the 12-month period. 

Fees for B Corp Certification enable B Lab to continuously improve business standards, fund community engagement and advocacy efforts, all working towards driving positive systemic change.

• Engagement: B Corp community engagement activities and event coordination.
• Communications: Delivery of marketing campaigns and ongoing internal and external communications.
• Evaluation & Verification: Local and global analysts reviewing each company’s assessment.
• Standards, tech and accountability: Continuing to develop the standards so that they remain fit for purpose for the future, the tech products that go alongside those standards, and the accountability mechanisms to ensure companies meet them. 
• Policy and campaigning: Developing and delivering advocacy work such as the Better Business Act to drive the widespread adoption of stakeholder governance at scale. 
• Governance: Management, finance and governance costs.
• Growth and training: Activities to attract and support and develop new B Corps and B Leaders.
• Operating expenses: The day-to-day costs of doing business.

We’re committed to building a diverse community of businesses while ensuring our movement remains inclusive and accessible. Alongside the verification fee, from July 2024, we are introducing new equity pricing to UK entrepreneurs facing systemic barriers to business ownership. This means equity pricing (a 40% reduction in the annual fee) will now be available to all B Corps that are:

• <£5m annual revenue; and
• >50% ownership: 
• People of colour and underrepresented ethnicities
• Women-owned
• LGBTQ-owned
• Disabled person owned

The 40% reduction is not available on the submission fee and verification fee. Please note that all pricing and fee reductions are subject to change.

This is an evolution of our previous equity pricing and means more businesses will be eligible and remain eligible. It will be applied automatically but there is an opportunity to opt-out.

For all newly certified and current B Corps that meet this criteria, the pricing will be automatically applied.

*please note that all pricing and fee reductions are subject to change

You can calculate your fees by heading to the pricing page and using the pricing calculator tool.

The submission fee is due after initial submission of a company’s assessment and is paid directly through the B Impact Assessment review page. An average company will then spend 2-3 months in the Evaluation stage to determine their eligibility, appropriate Impact Business Models and the correct approach for their review. Once this is complete, the company will be invoiced the verification fee in order to continue to the Verification stage.

All companies must be evaluated for their eligibility by B Lab as part of the review process. The submission fee is a small contribution towards these costs and a commitment on behalf of the company to the review process.

The submission fee is non-refundable, except for in special circumstances which can be discussed with your analyst during the review process. Companies who are ineligible to certify will be advised following submission, before a Standards Analyst is assigned. Refunds are not available after a Standards Analyst is assigned and Verification begins. 

During a company’s review, assessment scores may fluctuate. If a company’s score drops below the 80 points required to certify as a B Corp, the company is given a period of time to remedy this. If this is not achieved, the Review will be closed and the company will be required to pay the submission fee when they choose to submit again in the future.

The submission fee does not apply to companies submitting an assessment to become a Pending B Corp. For Pending B status, there is a separate one-time fee of £500 (+VAT).

The submission fee does not apply to the recertification of existing B Corps.

Companies pay the submission fee directly via the B Impact Assessment when submitting their assessment using a credit card or PayPal (once you have submitted, log in to the BIA, click Review on the left menu and navigate to the submission fee task). If you are having trouble paying the submission fee directly on the BIA, please email our certification team.

Once the fee is paid you will proceed to the Evaluation Queue, which is the stage before Evaluation. You can continue to refine your assessment and make improvements within your business whilst you wait in the Evaluation Queue. Your B Impact Assessment will only be ‘locked’ when an Analyst is assigned and begins to work with you. Up until that point, you can still edit answers in your BIA. Check out these Best Practice Guides to see if you can get some quick wins with further improvements!

The questions you will see in the Assessment are tailored based on the following characteristics of the company:

• Geography: Developed Markets; Emerging Markets

• Sector: Service; Wholesale/Retail; Manufacturing; Agriculture

• Employee size*: 0 Employees; 1-9 Employees; 10-49 Employees; 50-249 Employees; 250-1000 Employees; 1000+ Employees

*The key factor involved here is the number of Full-time equivalent employees that are employed on the company’s payroll.

The highest verified scores achieved on the BIA typically vary from year to year but are generally between 160-170 points. 

All Certified B Corps share their B Impact Assessment overall scores and category scores on their public profiles on bcorporation.uk. Public companies and their subsidiaries have extra transparency requirements and make their entire B Impact Assessment public, with particularly sensitive information like revenue redacted. Companies that have material items, such as lawsuits, on their Disclosure Questionnaire may also be required to make that disclosure transparent as well. 

In the two years between certification, all B Corps must write an Annual Impact Report on their progress to create positive impact.

The Annual Impact Report allows B Corps to be transparent and accountable to their stakeholders about their social and environmental impact, showcase best practice, encourage an open conversation and help build the business case for responsible business.

You can access guidance on how to write an Annual Impact Report here.

B Lab takes complaints seriously and appreciates those who come forward with them. Material complaints are overseen by B Lab's independent Standards Advisory Council. Learn more about our complaints process on our global site.

The standards for B Corp certification are created and overseen by B Lab's independent Standards Advisory Council (SAC), whose members bring industry and stakeholder expertise to the B Impact Assessment.

Although the SAC creates the standards, we invite all interested to provide feedback on the standards. The best way to submit your feedback is to log into the B Impact Assessment and select “Leave Feedback” next to each question. The Assessment also goes through a private and public beta period in which feedback is collected and integrated into final versions. Expert working groups are convened in order to explore our specific issues more closely in an objective manner. The Assessment is updated every three years in order to accommodate new and innovative practices, respond to the feedback of its users, and to more accurately assess the impact of all types of businesses.

In addition, B Lab has Regional Advisory Groups whose mandate is to deepen the engagement of regional experts in improving the Standards of the B Impact Assessment. Currently, B Lab has advisory groups in Latin America, East Africa, Australia and UK which provide constructive feedback and recommendations to B Lab and our SAC on regional specific issues.

The B Impact Assessment provides a judgement (via an objective, comprehensive rating) on how significant a company’s current social and environmental impact is. This is combined with the unique legal requirement for B Corps to embed consideration for all stakeholders in their governing documents and make a tangible commitment to the ‘triple bottom line’ of people, planet and profit.

The BIA is more than just an audit or an assessment, it is a comprehensive measurement of a company’s entire operations (governance, workers, community, environment and customers). Globally, our community of over 8200 B Corps are a movement of purpose-driven companies working together to advocate for a regenerative economy.

B Lab is always interested in collaborating with other organisations working in this space, for example, B Lab partnered with the United Nations Global Compact to develop the SDG Action Manager, a tool which is integrated with the B Impact Assessment to enable companies to manage their progress against the UN Sustainable Development Goals in conjunction with their B Impact Assessment.

Regular revisions have been made to the B Corp standards since B Lab's launch in 2006. B Lab is evolving the standards for B Corp Certification. Explore the latest iteration of the standards.

Prior to the release of each new version of the assessment, B Lab conducts both a private and public beta period that allows all stakeholders to provide feedback to the standards before they are published. All are welcome and encouraged to provide feedback on how the BIA can be improved. Users can leave feedback directly in the BIA platform using the Leave Feedback button next to each question.

B Lab is the non-profit organisation transforming the global economy to benefit all people, communities, and the planet. A leader in economic systems change, our global network creates standards, policies, and tools for business, and we certify companies — known as B Corps — who are leading the way.

B Lab envisions that all businesses in the world will measure and manage their impact as readily as they do profitability. Read more about how B Lab hopes to achieve this vision here.