BaseKit becomes B Corp certified to expedite its tech for good mission

BaseKit creates digital tools for micro-businesses across the world. The team is on a mission to democraticise tech, as Simon elaborates: “Sometimes people talk about democratising technology just in terms of ease of use. But we want technology to reach places where it might not get otherwise.”

This suite includes a website builder, an e-commerce platform, and a booking system. This enables micro businesses to sell their products online, efficiently and effectively.

Check out the full video interview with Simon here!

So what is a mirco business? Simon defines it as organisations with less than 10 full-time employees. “The idea is that we help those guys to take their first steps online. To start selling, to start transacting and ultimately to grow a livelihood through their grow business,” explains Simon. 

Their tech is then able to reach corners of the globe that are not yet monopolising the benefits of the digital revolution, ensuring that no one gets left behind. At its core, BaseKit’s purpose is a force for good. But as anyone who has dipped their toe into becoming a B Corp will know, it takes more than an admirable purpose to get certified.

“We hired 14 new people last year, and over 60% of those were from more diverse groups”

Simon tells us that BaseKit has been on the journey for the past few years, “It started with humble beginnings as we formed a group called the Green Team. This helped us to bring people together to start to think about how we can make a positive impact with the business that we have.”

From this, the team was spurred to make a flurry of changes. They began asking the important questions: how can we build climate positive tech? How can we do more on an individual basis, as well as a team? How can we imbed sustainable practices across the board?

This ideology has enabled BaseKit to consider People, Plant & Profit in the way they do business.

The crucial part about becoming a B Corp is that everything must be evidenced and consistent. It’s not a case of running one impactful initiative and never picking it up again. 

This mandate is precisely what BaseKit was after. “We wanted to have a structure to follow to help us understand the impact we’re having, and to measure that. We discovered B Corp, having seen other companies go through the process. We thought that would be a great framework for us to follow keep on track and continue to be a force for good.”

And so BaseKit kickstarted the process. One part of the mission was to become a genuinely green company. To reduce its carbon footprint, BaseKit teamed up with Ecologi and in 2022 they planted 15,529 trees, with a pledge to plant a further 30,000 in 2023. 

Simon tells us BaseKit also has, “a charity of the year called FareShare, who are all about helping to prevent food poverty, particularly in the kind of cost of living crisis that we’re in at the moment.”

Beyond this, BaseKit has also put in the work to create a more diverse and inclusive team. “We’ve implemented new ways of recruiting and interviewing new candidates to make sure there’s no bias involved. This has proven successful and resulted in about 60% of last year’s hires being from more diverse groups. This is really starting to address the unequal gender balance that is often prominent in technology,” says Simon.

Simon tells us that achiveing a better gender diversity was the hardest challenge they encountered: “It’s such a big problem in tech at the moment. It starts right from education, through to how a businesses conducts the recruitment, CV screening and interviewing processes.”

With such systemic problems, catalysing change doesn’t happen overnight. But BaseKit was able to commit to the cause, “We hired 14 new people last year, and over 60% of those were from more diverse groups. We were super happy with that. As a tech company, we’re now comfortably higher in terms of our female to male ratio, which is great.”

“We’re super happy and excited to have got to this point of certification. It really is the recognition of the hard work the team has put in to get us to this point. It reflects our company value of being a force for good,” Simon reflects.

BaseKit first began this journey several years ago. “I think we picked up the B Corp baton in earnest around about 18 months ago, and only just had a B Corp certification last week. So it’s a long process.”

“It’s key to remember that certification is not the end of the journey. It’s more like the very beginning”

Despite already having some positive practices in place, B Corp requires organisations to transform all of these good intentions into written policy. Everyone must be crytsal clear about how each aspect of the business is contributing towards the overall objectives.

“It’s been incredibly rewarding. I’ve learnt a lot throughout the process, and I know others in the business have as well. It has definitely been worth all the effort and pain to get to this point, and we’re so happy to have achieved certification.

“It’s key to remember that certification is not the end of the journey. It’s more like the very beginning. It gets you on the leaderboard and you have to continue putting in the work to stay there. It’s just one step for us, and our ambition is to make more progress over the next 12 months.”

If you think your organisation would benefit from BaseKits digital tools, Simon urges you to reach out. Get in touch at simon@basekit.com, visit their website, or check them out on LinkedIn.