Many fashion and footwear brands are notorious for their harmful treatment of both their workers and the environment. Fast fashion can lead to less than humane working conditions and low wages for employees.
Oliberté’s goal is to create a new brand lifestyle that challenges footwear’s reputation. We take pride in ensuring safe and healthy working conditions for our employees while providing livable, fair wages. Here are all the ways that Oliberté works to give back to the community.
What Does B Corp Mean?
A Certified B Corporation is a business following high ethical standards that follow the B Corp Declaration of Interdependence. This certification verifies that the corporation is actively contributing and giving back to society through social and environmental efforts, as well as providing public transparency.
To become a Certified B Corp, a company must meet requirements within three pillars: unique, material, and credible.
The certification process begins with the B Impact Assessment (BIA), a 200-question assessment that analyzes your company’s day-to-day operations and business model. Upon completion of the BIA, companies must meet the legal requirement. The legal requirements change depending on where the company is located, but it provides framework that helps businesses make structural changes while considering the impact of their decisions on stakeholders.
Oliberté has been a proud B Corp-certified business since June 2012. View our full scores here.
How We Support Canada’s Community
Oliberté’s mission is to utilize ethical practices and practice environmental stewardship no matter where we are located. Through our move to Canada, we continued this mission to give back to the communities in which we work, and our employees live. Here are a few ways that Oliberté gives back to Canada’s community.
Made in Canada Masks
When the pandemic hit, we rolled up our sleeves and got to work making both medical and non-medical face masks. Our mission has always been to help support workers’ rights. COVID-19 lockdown caused so many people to lose their jobs. Oliberté was determined to continue supporting the Canadian economy through this time by keeping jobs open for our employees.
Fair Wages to Boost the Economy
We are determined to continue providing fair wages to our employees in our Canadian factory. By doing this, combined with showing our pride for the Canadian community, our employees help boost the Canadian community that they live in. More money in the economy increases the standard of living for people living in Canada, whether they work for our company or not.
By providing fair wages, we aim to help raise the quality of life for our workers, who dedicate their time to ensuring that the quality of our boots, masks, gorilla wax, and toques all meet the same high standards that you have come to expect from our products.
How Our Partners Fuel Our Goals
As a company that dedicates time to ensuring we follow ethical practices that improve both society and the environment, we make conscious efforts to work with businesses that share similar missions to our own.
Vibram
Vibram not only makes the best soles in the world, but they also remain cautious of their carbon footprint. Vibram uses six pillars to strategize sustainability and ensure that they are remaining environmentally conscious at all times. In their Vibram’s USA locations, 100% of their energy is renewable. They also focus heavily on recycling industrial water used to produce their soles.
A Promising Outlook on an Ethical Future
In Canada, the amount of jobs provided by domestic manufacturing continues to grow. Having more companies creating high-quality consumer goods domestically will lead to its increase in popularity. Fostering the growth of domestic manufacturing in Canada means that more job opportunities will grow and help boost Canada’s economy.
We want to create a wave of encouragement through other domestic businesses to provide fair wages and benefits to employees that help improve their quality of life. Purchasing boots or face masks from Oliberté means supporting a company that dedicates the time to following ethical practices each day within our factories.
Globally, companies practicing social responsibility have increased in popularity. Consumers have become wary of businesses that commit both social and environmental injustices and have instead turned to favor businesses hoping for positive societal change. For Oliberté, that means continuing to help encourage other businesses to follow humane practices.
