Business View Magazine | Volume 8, Issue 9

113 BUSINESS VIEW MAGAZINE VOLUME 8, ISSUE 9 BRADFORD SOAP WORKS They were also the first personal care products manufacturer to offer soap bases using palm oil from Rainforest Alliance Certified™ farms. “In 2012, we worked with the Rainforest Alliance to find a suitable palm oil plantation in Central America,” Benton recalls. “From there, we knew exactly where our palm oil was being sourced and that it was going straight to our West Warwick factory, where we could put it into a bar. So, we opened that opportunity up to our customers, and some notable brands took advantage of it. Tom’s of Maine, Colgate, Amway – they can all use that little green frog logo.” The Bradford team next traveled to Ghana to visit the communities that process their shea butter. “We went in to see how the shea was collected,” Benton explains. “We wanted to make sure that the story we’re telling is true. We saw how the Global Shea Alliance, a nonprofit, organized these different communities to work together so there’d be enough volume of shea butter to produce a year-round supply, and the industry would develop in a way that would increase the women’s income. Because when women make equivalent amounts of money, they get a voice at the table. They get to buy medicine for their children. They get to send their children to school. It’s quite powerful. Through this program, Bradford has committed to plant 1,000 shea trees in Ghana over five years.” With demand for good corporate citizenship being at an all-time high, Bradford has taken hold of every golden opportunity to engage its employees through social impact innovation initiatives, like the one with Global Shea. For example, in 2019, the company turned its focus to Africa to see if its surplus soap could be used to stimulate jobs and economic growth, while empowering women who’d found themselves in vulnerable circumstances. “When you make soap, the process is sort of equivalent to making biscuits: you roll out