Hello, friend of Benjamin Bridge! Welcome to our new journal, where we will share more about the winery, the people behind the wines, and our practices as a farm winery, rural Nova Scotia employer, trailblazing winemakers, responsible citizens, and land stewards.
As of 29 February 2024, Benjamin Bridge farm winery is B Corp Certified, joining a vast community of corporations that use business as a force for good. Benjamin Bridge is the second winery in Canada and one of only 25 other wineries in the world to achieve this rigorous sustainability certification. If you are familiar with B Corp, you’ll know just how meaningful this third-party certification is, and if not, read on to learn more with us.
Benjamin Bridge has been on a journey to sustainability certification since day one—we just didn’t know it at the time. In 1999 when Gerry McConnell and Dara Gordon started this ambitious and daring project to create an internationally recognised sparkling wine house in the Annapolis Valley, their goal was to be a ‘positive addition to the landscape’, to blow minds with the quality of wines from our terroir, and to reflect their personal and professional values of transparency, justice, and equality. These values are woven into the fabric of Benjamin Bridge, taking shape in countless ways in the everyday life of the winery. Discovering B Corp’s approach to sustainability gave us the opportunity to document, verify, and now express all of these values to our team members, our community, our customers, and our suppliers, including our small roster of grape growers.
So while this certification is brand new, what has changed on the ground is simply that we have many more of our policies and commitments in writing and available to all team members. While already on track with our progressive practices, B Corp provided a meaningful framework to help us identify gaps, set out plans to improve our operations and meet emerging sustainability standards.
What does it mean to be a B Corp?
As a B Corp we’re part of a global community of companies dedicated to using business as a force for good.
From B Lab’s website:
"B Corp Certification is a designation that a business is meeting high standards of verified performance, accountability, and transparency on factors from employee benefits and charitable giving to supply chain practices and input materials…B Corp Certification is holistic, not exclusively focused on a single social or environmental issue."
The intensive assessment and verification process focuses on five main categories in which you are scored: Governance, Workers, Customers, Environment, and Community. The dynamic aspect of this process allows for organizations to rank highly in some categories with opportunities for improvement in others; overall one has to achieve a score of 80 points to apply for certification. Benjamin Bridge’s public profile and current score can be viewed here.
Governance
Benjamin Bridge’s articles of incorporation have been modified to include a commitment to B Corp certification, taking a concrete step to protect the future of the business. Our mission is locked in place, meaning this status will be unchanged in the event of a future ownership change. Additionally, we have formalised that management must take social and environmental factors under consideration when making decisions about our operations, and committed to transparently sharing financial information with our full team members in an ‘open book management’ style.
We are proudly formal allies with Glooscap First Nation, signing a memorandum of understanding in June 2021 to cement our friendship and commitment to working together. This act of reconciliation is imperative for our continued success, as we continue to farm and steward the lands of Sikunema’katik, unceded Mi’kmaq territory, because we are all treaty people.
Workers
Firstly, we support 50 full time, year round jobs in our rural area of Nova Scotia. Team members at Benjamin Bridge are given a handbook that outlines all company and workplace policies, so they have clarity around grievances, sick days, employee rights, work schedules, and code of conduct. All full time team members have robust and generous health benefits that far exceed industry norms for a business of our size, that covers drug, dental and wellness services like acupuncture, osteopathy, psychology, and physiotherapy. Team members also take priority when it comes to profits: all of our profits for the past 25 years have been reinvested in the team’s advancement in wages and resources, equipment, and business growth.
Community
Another category that is close to our hearts is looking after our community. 65% our purchases from independent suppliers come from the local community, which for us is defined as the Annapolis Valley and Halifax Metro, or an 80km radius. This includes the grapes purchased from our dozen or so small farm vineyards who are arguably the most crucial link in our supply chain.
We have long since supported educational visits to the farm and our team generously gives hundreds of hours to various panels, associations, boards, and community organisations. In 2023 alone, we collectively volunteered 2,288 hours in our local communities, from Aylesford to Tantallon to Dartmouth, in sectors like women’s shelters, sick kids, animal welfare, firefighting, and nature preservation. In the same year we donated nearly 2% of our revenue to various charities, grassroots organizations, and social causes.
Environment
By managing our 170 acres with regenerative principles, and working with our grape growers locally, our environmental performance was a bit of a shoo in, but we look forward to making improvements in this area. While on the farm we prioritise soil health, carbon sequestration, water management, and emissions reduction, we also manage a biodiversity program that includes an apiary, no-till organic culinary garden, and pollinator gardens. This program will be growing in the coming years and we plan to create a 100 year ecological conservation plan in consultation with community experts. Today, we are calculating our overall greenhouse gas emissions which will evolve into a measurable plan to either sequester or offset all of our outputs.
Customers
If you’ve been a customer of ours who has encountered an issue with an experience, a credit card charge, or a corked bottle of wine, you’ll know that we excel in our customer care. We truly treat our customers as we wish to be treated as customers in the world ourselves. We safely manage personal data, strictly follow all digital communication laws to the letter, and meticulously track all feedback, complaints, and quality issues, and strive to provide a warm, transparent, and efficient level of service.
We proudly share these behind the scenes details with you and hope that it brings you closer to Benjamin Bridge as a brand, as a winery, and as a collective of people who wish to see positive change in the world. Each time you purchase a bottle of our wine or visit our Gaspereau Valley winery, you’re not just supporting an excellent wine producer, or a small agricultural business, you’re supporting these efforts in environmental sustainability, social impact, and ethical, transparent governance. Your support makes our unwavering commitment to positive change possible and directly impact the lives of the people who live and work here.
Here's to the future
If you’re new here or have been a longtime fan of Benjamin Bridge, we welcome you to follow us on the journey as we continue to push boundaries, question convention, revere tradition, and dream big. We will continue to share new developments here and on our sustainability page. Please reach out if you have any questions or comments to share with us!
So here's to the future—to countless more vintages, to new friendships forged over a shared love of wine, and to a world where sustainability isn't just a dream but a delicious reality.