What Does It Mean to be Socially Responsible?

Social responsibility simply means that we all, as individuals, businesses, communities, countries, and as a planet, have a responsibility to society. By working to positively impact our society creatively, diligently, and on as many levels as possible, we can be positively socially responsible.

What Does Social Responsibility Mean to The Works Bakery Café?

Social responsibility is a big part of who we are at The Works. We believe in being positive members of the communities we inhabit, rather than just being a storefront in them. We start with our own employees, by being committed to developing a positive working environment with room for personal growth. We also commit to making sure that our core staff earn a truly livable wage and have access to important benefits like health insurance and paid vacation. We also give our staff paid time off to reach out to our communities through volunteer activities. All of our stores, and as a company, reach out through volunteerism, product donations, and event sponsorship, to support events and causes that are important to our communities. Social responsibility is an ongoing commitment we should all make to each other, and The Works is always looking for new ways to positively impact our society, outside our front doors, and beyond.

The Commitment

The Works Bakery Café believes not only in stating our commitment to social responsibility, but in truly living it, each day. Below you will find an ever growing list of things we, as a company, have believed in and committed to, in order to build stronger communities and foster a sense of social responsibility in our stores and in the places we live and work.

• Sponsor of annual AIDS benefit concert, which raised over $10,000 for Monadnock Family Services.
• Sponsor of athletic programs, clubs, teams, tri-athletes (Summer soccer team state champions 2 of the last 4 seasons, local bike team/club one of the largest in New England with The Works being the founding Corporate sponsor).
• Contributor to Heart Association events throughout New England.
• Contributor to Community Kitchen, homeless shelters, Humane Society, local schools, art centers, music festivals, as well as organizers of community holiday dinners.
• Corporate donor for local recreational park in Manchester, VT.
• Corporate Sponsor of Race for The Cure in Vermont for 8 years.
• Corporate sponsor of Grief Relief concert, which raised over $5,000 for orphaned children in Northern New England.
• The Works Bakery Café operates with the principle of open book management. This means that we share our operating numbers with every member of our team, providing training and support to help everyone understand what they mean. This supports a spirit of transparency and honesty within The Works team.
• When The Works Bakery Café must borrow money for any reason, we use the Chittenden Bank Socially Responsible Banking Fund. Chittenden Bank, a Vermont-based full service banking institution, brings together depositors who wish to support socially responsible causes with borrowers who want to use funds to engage in socially responsible business. The focus of this fund is to create affordable housing, business and economic development, conservation and agriculture, downtown revitalization, community building, and education.
• In 2006 Richard French, president of The Works Bakery Café, received the New Hampshire Business Excellence Award for outstanding achievement in Hospitality, as well as receiving The Outstanding Citizens Under 40 award a few years ago.
• In January of 2008, The Works sponsored a Yoga Day U.S.A. event to support the HCS Hospice Program.
• In 2008, our Manchester, VT we were a sponsor for a local conference on sustainable organic agriculture, supporting local growers in order to reduce greenhouse gas emissions related to food transport, sustainable building practices, and renewable energy.
• Monthly store budget for donations to community causes (annual contributions in excess of $8,700).
• Member of Vermont, Maine & New Hampshire Businesses for Social Responsibility, Business Partnership for Peace, Vermont Land Trust, and Social Venture Network.
• Member of NHBSR Steering Committee to promote and attract other Socially Responsible Businesses in New Hampshire.
• Nominated for the 1992 Feather Award at the NEBSR annual conference for high levels of social responsibility.
• Not-for-profit partnerships with each store and area organizations, with The Works raising over $10,000 annually for these Not-for-profit organizations.
• Member of all local Chambers of Commerce.
• Check back regularly to find new ways in which we continue to support our mission to create a better world through a commitment to positively impact our communities.

Environmental Responsibility: What Does That Mean?

The idea of environmental responsibility encompasses many concepts, but especially the idea that working toward a healthier planet should be important to everyone. By engaging in ethical consumerism, meaning buying products that minimize environmental impact whenever possible, working to recycle, working to reduce your carbon footprint, and working toward environmental education in order to improve the environment are all part of individual environmental responsibility. Businesses, from the smallest mom and pop operation to the largest multi-national corporation can all work to be better global citizens through a focus on environmental responsibility.

What Does Environmental Responsibility Mean to The Works Bakery Café?

Environmental responsibility means that we at The Works Bakery Café do whatever we can to be good stewards of our natural world, working to conserve resources, use low-impact products, increase energy efficiency, and reduce pollution. As “green” science gains more global importance, new ideas to improve our environment are always being proposed. At the Works, we are constantly looking at ideas, old and new, that could help us run a more environmentally responsible business, and implementing these ideas into practice whenever possible. We have certain environmental principles that we are committed to as a part of the day to day operation of our stores. We use low impact products. We buy local, not only to support other local businesses, but also to ensure that our products travel the shortest distances possible to reduce fossil fuel consumption. We build and upgrade sustainably. We also sponsor events and organizations that work toward a healthier planet in our communities whenever possible. Ultimately, environmental responsibility means to continue learning and growing, to find new ways to be a good corporate citizen of this planet.

The Commitment

Operating Principles

• We use flour that is never bleached and never bromated.
• Whenever possible, we use unbleached paper products such as napkins and soy ink for printing.
• We use environmentally-friendly, biodegradable, and non-toxic cleaning products.
• Our high-quality cream cheese comes from a St. Albans, Vermont Co-op which supports family farms and is openly against bovine growth hormones, which means our cream cheese is local, fresh, and natural.
• During the growing season, we purchase as much of our produce as we can from Westminster Organics, in Westminster Station, Vermont, a local family-run farm who have been certified organic since 1985, which means that their produce is clean and safe, as well as fresh and delicious.
• We use fair-trade coffee products that are farmed sustainable and that is good for both the planet and the farmers who grow these products. By using fair-trade agreements we ensure that farmers benefit from their labors, and by encouraging the use of sustainable farming, we can all protect precious natural resources.
• In all of our stores, we live by the principles of “reduce, reuse, recycle”.
• We encourage our customers to reduce waste by using refillable containers whenever possible, such as coffee mugs and cream cheese containers, and we offer them a discount when they do.
• We use only Stoneyfield Organic Yogurt in all smoothies and parfaits.
• In all of our new construction and remodeling projects we use only marmoleum tables, bamboo flooring, low VOC paints and wood certified by the Forest Stewardship Council, a non-profit organization dedicated to the responsible management of our planet’s forests.

Events and Involvement

• Recent sponsor of NOFA-VT event; The Works Bakery Café President, Richard French acted as a presenter at this event. NOFA is the Northeast Organic Farming Association, a not-for-profit organization of consumers, businesses, and farmers committed to supporting local organic agriculture, that works to promote necessary information and knowledge to create, sustain, and grow the cultivation and consumption of organic products.
• Provide over 100 dozen bagels to EarthWork NH volunteer crews year after year.
• Creator/Sponsor of Ecological Park with Antioch NE, and Rice Oil (Keene, NH).
• Community Supported Agriculture, or CSA, deliver locally grown organic foods to community members who subscribe, all season. Many Works Bakery Café Stores are CSA drop spots to provide opportunity for the growth of this important project.
• The Works worked to fund a walk-in cooler for the Teleion Holon Holistic Retreat in Manchester, Vermont to buoy their efforts in Community Supported Agriculture.
• Helped secure a $35,000 grant from NASE (National Association of Self Employed) which went to Hillside Springs Farm, a biodynamic organic CSA farm in Westmoreland, NH. This grant allowed them to double their greenhouse capacity, enabled two acres to be cleared for crop rotation, helped them acquire a new draft horse team of Percheron horses and enabled them to be fiscally sustainable by growing the farm’s subscribership from 35 to 55 members.