Throughout the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, businesses have seen consumers become increasingly concerned with and focused on corporate social responsibility. As the pandemic forced quarantines and lockdowns, many organizations had to make extremely difficult business decisions that impacted not only their clients and consumers but also their employees. The lockdowns in many cases required businesses to halt operations completely, which often led to massive layoffs, supply chain disruptions, cash flow issues, and even business closures, leaving vast portions of the population out of work with limited options for finding sufficient employment. It was at this point that many consumers started to seek out and support small businesses and brands that did all they could to support their employees as well as the communities in which they operated.
At UpCity, we wanted to explore how an increasing number of small businesses are becoming concerned with public relations and embracing a social mission strategy throughout the next year. We partnered with Pollfish to survey 600 respondents from the United States and Canada who work in marketing, public relations, and human resources to explore the different types of missions that their organizations have taken up in the wake of COVID-19. We asked about volunteer work being performed locally, charity or mission donations, sustainable business practices, and whether they offer these same opportunities to give back and contribute to their staff as well as their existing and potential customers.
Our findings will address the following aspects:
- Social missions and charity involvement
- Social responsibility workplace benefits
- Sustainable business practices
To support the survey results, we reached out directly to additional small business owners, marketing and public relations experts, and human resources professionals to allow them to share their insight in their own words on the importance of having a social mission in 2022, and how they’ve embraced the importance of corporate social responsibility over the last year in response to consumer trends.
Social Missions and Charity Involvement
53% of U.S. and Canadian small businesses currently stand by a social mission in 2022
We’ll start our discussion of the survey findings by showing that more than half of our respondents are already working to support a social mission in 2022. It’s interesting to look at the number of businesses who don’t currently have a social plan in place but plan to is more than half of the remaining respondents, showing just how influential the consumer demand for more mindful business practices, especially amongst Millennials, has become two years out from the start of the pandemic.
Entrepreneurs and small business leaders are starting to see the significant benefits of embracing social missions, such as increased employee satisfaction and retention, which is critical in the post-pandemic economy where so many employees are willing to leave an employer in search of better opportunities.
53% – We currently have a social mission that we stand by
28% – We don’t currently have a social mission but we plan to create one in 2022
19% – We don’t currently have a social mission and we don’t plan to create one in the foreseeable future
61% of respondents said that social missions are highly important to them and their businesses
In addition to the benefits of retention and satisfaction of your employees, a social mission can help to bolster and sustain consumer interest in your brand. As consumers come to trust your brand more, they become more invested in the brand’s success and willing to provide meaningful insight and feedback your team can in turn leverage as a powerful source to drive innovation leading to long-term sustainable growth. It follows then, that 86% of our respondents find social missions at least somewhat important to their ongoing success.
61% – Very important
25% – Somewhat important
9% – Neutral
5% – Unimportant
18% of respondents focus on or plan to focus on a 2022 social mission related to health and wellness, including mental health support
The isolation that came along with the quarantines and work-from-home requirements throughout the pandemic has had a profoundly negative impact on the mental health of employees everywhere. One of the most in-demand and critical social missions employers have undertaken is to provide the support necessary to help employees recover and maintain their health and wellness, especially on the mental health front. These programs are designed to help employees cope with and recover from long-term isolation and the fears that came along with having to navigate daily life in the midst of a global disaster event. Mental health-focused programs are also crucial in helping employees deal with the grief of losing loved ones and close friends to disease throughout the pandemic at a time when people may not be able to access or rely on their normal support systems.
14% – Human rights, racial, and gender equity
6% – Housing insecurity
9% – Food insecurity and nutrition support
8% – Youth and education policy organizations
18% – Health and wellness, including mental health support
13% – Environmental sustainability
8% – Animal welfare
4% – Refugee and immigration services
9% – Workforce development/technology accessibility
5% – Transportation accessibility
6% – Other
Entrepreneurs and small business owners across the professional community at large see the value in embracing social missions as part of the recovery and long-term stability of their brand.
“We actively support causes such as Black Lives Matter, which is a contentious issue among employees, customers, investors, and the general public. To help drive more business to minority-owned, women-owned, veteran-owned, and other businesses, we’re also marketing their items.”
—Adam Wood, Co-Founder, RevenueGeeks
“Yes! We care deeply about sustainable packaging and reducing waste so we donate 1% of our revenue toward cleaning up ocean debris. It’s also important to us that our packaging doesn’t end up in the ocean so every piece of packaging we ship to customers is either recyclable, compostable, or biodegradable. We do this because the ocean is arguably the most important natural resource on our planet. It’s what gives us life. We also love it because we’re sailors, snorkelers, divers, paddleboarders, and more. We’re ocean fanatics, to say the least.”
—Kelly Van Arsdale, Co-Founder, Spinnaker Chocolate
“Our social mission is to offset our environmental impact, empower underprivileged groups, and support local initiatives whenever possible. We do this through company-wide and employee-driven initiatives such as tree-planting days, working with local NGOs, and more. This is important to us because we want to be a company that not only provides top-tier services but also leaves a positive footprint on society. We believe that businesses have a responsibility to give back, and we are proud to do our part.”
—Mark Koning, Chief Human Resources Officer, Discover Business
Out of the 19% of small businesses that don’t plan to have a social mission, 43% of them note that it’s because it’s not relevant to their business/industry
While the embrace of social missions is often relevant and essential for the success of a small business, there are instances where organizations feel this isn’t the case. Ignoring situations where an organization might not be in a position to dedicate the resources to do so, 43% of the small businesses with no plans to enact a social mission feel that social issues were not relevant to their brand.
This could stem from the fact that some of these organizations feel that social responsibility could conflict with their fiscal obligations and bottom-line profitability goals, or tie up operational resources that would impact efficiency. In some cases, there are also business owners and work teams who don’t feel strongly about enacting social missions and have chosen to avoid pursuing ways of integrating social missions into their own operations.
Reasons for not planning to have a social mission
21% – Lack of time and resources
43% – Not relevant to my business/industry
22% – I don’t feel strongly about the current social issues
15% – Other
39% of small business owners stated that they personally donate to the social mission of their choice on a regular basis. 33% of those respondents personally donate $500-$1,200 each year
For those small business owners and entrepreneurs to whom social messaging is important, there is a myriad of ways to support a near-infinite number of causes. Of our respondents who do incorporate social action into their business practices, 77% also use personal monetary donations outside of their business at least occasionally to make an impact on social issues important to them. The movement to embrace social actions is so strong that an additional 16% of those respondents intend to start donating personally this year.
39% – I personally donate regularly
38% – I personally donate occasionally
16% – I don’t personally donate but I plan to in 2022
7% – I don’t personally donate and I don’t plan to in the foreseeable future
Personal donation amounts per year
32% – Less than $500
33% – $500-$1,200
20% – $1,300-$3,000
8% – $3,001-$5,000
7% – $5,001+
38% of small business owners and their teams volunteer at charity events multiple times per year
Charity events are a great way for a business to fold social action into their business practices in a visible and meaningful way. Aside from the positive boosts to employee morale at the ability to contribute to community well-being, charity events are opportunities for brand exposure and a way to convert that exposure into benefits to the local community. Internally, charity donations help your business mitigate the bottom line through tax deductions.
38% – My team and I volunteer at charity events multiple times a year
32% – My team and I volunteer at a charity event once a year
20% – My team and I don’t currently volunteer but we plan to in 2022
10% – My team and I don’t plan to volunteer in the foreseeable future
Our community of respondents were equally invested in ensuring they were actively participating in local volunteer opportunities.
“As a company, we volunteer about twice a quarter at local animal shelters, soup kitchens, and churches. We also donate money to these organizations including The Pet Fund. I think we’ve been volunteering for approximately three years. Sometimes we’ll do free painting for them but other times we help at local events, walk the dogs at the local humane society, and things like that. We do it because we want to make a difference in the community. I’ve lived here for years and so have most of my employees. This community has been good to us and we want to give something back.”
—Chris Gardner, Owner, PaintRite Pros
“Our company has various initiatives for charities. As part of our observance of Women’s History Month, we recently volunteered at a women’s center. Our employees brought food and clothing and advocated for their crochet products, which the center introduced to the women as a hobby. We don’t have a fixed schedule for volunteering, but we usually do around 10 to 15 community outreach initiatives every year based on our records. This includes a wide range of charities— from something simple as donating clothes and food, to more laborious efforts like building homes in partnership with Habitat to Humanity.”
—Stephen Keighery, CEO and Founder, Home Buyer Louisiana
“Cast21 volunteers with many different organizations, but the most common missions we support are around education equity and inclusion. Cast21 is a healthcare company, and many of our company’s STEM leaders are first-generation college graduates and are minorities. Access is an important theme to us and our patients. Our company volunteers as a collective at least once a quarter. Each team member also participates in community events on their own accord. Volunteering and community involvement are a cornerstone of our company. We have been volunteering as an organization since Cast21 was incorporated in 2016 and have been volunteering as individuals for years prior.”
—Ashley S. Moy, CEO, Cast21
Out of the 10% of respondents who don’t plan to volunteer, 33% of them noted that they and their team lack the time and resources
Throughout the last two years of the COVID-19 pandemic, local volunteer and fundraising events were largely canceled due to quarantines and social distancing requirements. Only since late into 2021 and the start of 2022 have some communities started to ease restrictions and allow live gatherings. This accounts for the percentage of respondents claiming a lack of events or interest in taking part in such events. However, the other impact of the pandemic has been to impact many businesses’ bottom lines, limiting the resources and personnel who have the time and ability to contribute to such events.
14% – Lack of local charity events in the immediate area
33% – My team and I currently don’t have the time or resources to
16% – The local charity events don’t align with our social mission(s)
17% – Not enough team members have expressed interest in volunteering
11% – There’s no streamlined volunteer platform to utilize
9% – Other
14% of both U.S. and Canadian small businesses volunteer most frequently for health and wellness-related local charities
As we discussed above, 18% of our respondents are putting their social action efforts into health-related movements, especially those relating to mental health. With this focus, it follows that their actual volunteer efforts will be largely geared towards health and wellness.
In line with the reasoning we outlined previously, the pandemic has caused increased isolation and grief due to the loss of loved ones, making health and wellness one of the most impactful spaces businesses can work to support. Aside from health and wellness, the pandemic also greatly impacted the housing and food stability in large swaths of the population, which in turn can impact those same peoples’ mental insecurities.
12% – Human rights, racial, and gender equity
8% – Housing insecurity
11% – Food insecurity and nutrition support
11% – Youth and education policy organizations
14% – Health and wellness, including mental health support
9% – Environmental sustainability
10% – Animal welfare
6% – Refugee and immigration services
9% – Workforce development/technology accessibility
7% – Transportation accessibility
2% – Other
53% of small business owners also said that their team has engaged with a volunteering platform to organize opportunities and that the platform was well-received
With limited time and resources at their disposal, it follows that small business owners would utilize a tool to help them organize and plan out their volunteering and social action efforts.
Using these platforms helps increase engagement by the staff by clearly communicating initiatives and opportunities to contribute, and increased participation allows more of your employees to gain relevant community-oriented skills they can leverage to participate in future events they may not currently be prepared to support.
By increasing your team’s charitable engagement, you’ll over time help to improve your brand’s reputation for giving back to the community.
53% – Yes, and it has been well received by the team
32% – No, but we have an interest in doing so in 2022
15% – No, and we have no plans to in 2022
In the post-COVID economic landscape, more and more organizations are getting involved with their communities in order to participate in volunteer and charity opportunities to boost their brand with consumers. Internally, business owners are matching those efforts by providing employees with enhanced support relative to employee health and wellness with a particular focus on mental health support. Combined, this internal and external focus on social awareness tactics is helping businesses in a number of ways we’ll break down further below.
Social Responsibility Workplace Benefits
53% of businesses have an in-house social responsibility team to assist with social awareness-related missions and opportunities
With 80% of our respondents either having an in-house social responsibility team or planning to implement one in the coming year, it’s clear that organizations understand the many benefits that we’ve enumerated throughout the discussion so far. Let’s enumerate these benefits altogether here, so as to better understand why social action benefits your business.
- Increased exposure in the community and being seen doing positive things will increase your organization’s reputation and boost their trust, overall increasing brand recognition.
- Customer loyalty will increase as your business is seen to be contributing to the communal good.
- Employees become more engaged both with their work and with the social programs at their jobs, both leading to increased retention.
- All of these factors combined drive revenue growth as well as make it easier for entrepreneurs and small businesses to raise capital when necessary.
- Overall, these benefits result in an entrenched competitive advantage relative to other businesses that might not be engaging in in-depth social activism in-house.
53% – My business currently has an in-house social responsibility team
27% – I plan to create an in-house responsibility team in 2022
21% – I don’t plan to create an in-house social responsibility team in the foreseeable future
We reached out to our community of business owners and professionals to find out how their companies are handling their in-house social responsibility efforts and what benefits they feel their efforts are affording them.
“The benefit of having an in-house social responsibility team is that we can find charities and nonprofit organizations that are better matched with our company values since our employees have a more comprehensive understanding.”
—George Beatty, CEO, Problem Property Pals
“My firm has an in-house social responsibility team. The biggest benefit is that the team genuinely understands the company’s core values and what it stands for; this enables them to work in a way that better aligns with the firm’s main objectives.”
—Ben Wagner, Real Estate Investor & House Flipper, Leave the Key
“An in-house responsibility team helps our organization in several ways. First, it helps us modify and align business goals with the social view. Since this team is dedicated to keeping in touch with what the public is saying about how their products impact them, we utilize their insights to orient our products to fit the market. Secondly, it helps us maintain our reputation. By engaging in sustainable business practices, this team paints the organization as worthy of its growing recognition among consumers. This team shares positive stories about our company with the community through close interaction, which is an excellent strategy to maintain a reputation.”
—John Tian, Co-Founder, Mobitrix.com
30% of small businesses allow paid time for employees to volunteer with an organization of their choice
People today are busier than ever in both their personal and professional lives, and it’s extremely difficult to make time for social action and community involvement. What better way, then, for an employer to boost employee morale than to support that desire by incentivizing volunteer work. Not only does doing so boost employee loyalty to their company, but it also helps to recruit top-level talent by boosting brand reputation. Additionally, when you incentivize your team to get more involved with volunteer and social action initiatives, you help to improve their relationships with each other, improve teamwork, and boost creativity.
Social Impact Benefits Offered
30% – Paid time for employees to volunteer at an organization of their choice
28% – Donation match programs
22% – My company currently doesn’t offer social impact benefits but we plan to in 2022
13% – My company currently doesn’t offer social impact benefits and we don’t plan to in the foreseeable future
6% – Other
The trend towards increasing social action-focused benefits and expanding the support of staff increasing their own activism efforts is fairly widespread, enough so that we wanted to gather more insight from other professionals throughout the community about how their own businesses have expanded social awareness-related benefits.
“To help combat the ever-growing cost of education in the U.S. every year, we offer a semi-annual scholarship of $2,500 plus donations from our customers, to one student who is enrolled at either a community college or University. The scholarship is provided to high school senior students who aspire to be a lawyer and are not financially able to pay for their careers.”
—David Mara, Founder & Attorney, Mara Law Firm
“My company offers social awareness-related benefits. We give reward points to employees who take part in volunteer programs and charity drives. The reward points are redeemed as an employee bonus after three to four months. Moreover, our company gives recognition shields and certificates to employees at annual charity events. The employees are also appreciated on social media for their hard work.”
—Mari Hutton, Marketing Manager, Rent1
“My employees contribute a certain amount towards a social mission as part of their responsibility. This amount isn’t fixed, so people give whatever they are comfortable with. I give a paid day off or a gift card to these employees. This encourages them to be more socially aware and responsible.”
—David Morgan, Owner, Snorkel Mart
The benefits of embracing social responsibility and encouraging your staff to do the same cannot be stressed enough. Not only does it create a happier and more engaged relationship between your staff, but can also help to improve the overall bottom line of your organization through the improved perception from potential new customers and vendors for being more engaged with the community.
Sustainable Business Practices
67% of U.S. and Canadian respondents noted that their businesses practice sustainability
The growing dangers of climate change have caused an increasing number of organizations to embrace environmentally-friendly business practices. Businesses seem to be making the effort to institute sustainable practices are gaining attention from consumers and employers as being more conscientious than those who ignore the demand for environmentally-friendly business practices. While this can be highly specific based on the industry in question, a large number of our respondents claim to either already have implemented business practices that are more environmentally conscious or plan to in the coming year.
67% – My business has implemented practices to become more environmentally conscious
24% – My team and I plan on implementing more sustainable practices
9% – I don’t plan on implementing more sustainable business practices in the foreseeable future
24% of those businesses prioritize more recycling
One of the easiest ways to make an environmental impact that offices can make is to prioritize recycling and reducing the carbon footprint in the office by increasing the eco-friendliness of office operations and equipment. However, over the last two years, one element that is alluded to in our survey results is the positive impact remote work arrangements have had throughout the pandemic. By allowing employees to work remotely where possible or required, businesses were able to indirectly reduce almost all aspects of their businesses’ environmental impacts, from reducing carbon emissions by reducing the number of drivers on the road to decreasing the amount of waste by embracing digital alternatives to many of their operational practices.
Our community of experts weighed in on their own efforts to improve the sustainability of their business practices and how those changes have evolved in the last few years.
“On the technological side, we are sustainable because we use modern technology in production that contributes to the preservation and protection of the environment. The materials we work with are recycled, and we have moved our business online completely. In addition, we encourage our customers to recycle after use.”
—Mike Sheety, Director, ThatShirt
“Our mission is to play a significant part in solving the low recycling rates that exist in both the USA & Europe. We do so by upcycling water bottles and aluminum into fashionable eyewear. All of our eyewear, cleaning cloths, and cases are made from recycled material, and our lenses are sustainable. Our eyewear is designed with durable material through our innovative upcycling process. Our technology allows us to reduce approximately 80% of our carbon footprint, and we strive for carbon neutrality, planting trees to offset the CO2 the product creates.”
—Fabio Ferracane, Founder & CEO, MITA Eyewear
“Sustainability is the core practice for our team. The most significant sustainable approach up till now is the shift to the digital workplace, which means that the use of paper is almost eradicated.”
—Lauren Proctor, Marketing Head & Designer, BenchMade Modern
54% of small businesses allow their customers to donate a portion of their subscription or purchase to a charity
Involving your client base in your social activism and community involvement allows your customers and community to get involved more easily than if they had to seek out opportunities to do so on their own. By allowing your community and clients to allocate a percentage of their fees to a specific charity, the community and your brand benefit in different ways, but it’s an overall win for all involved parties. Brand awareness receives a boost for supporting the community, your clients receive all of the benefits of charitable donations and can signal their own support for community well-being, and meaningful causes receive the boosted support they need to sustain themselves.
54% – We currently allow customers to donate to a charity
28% – We plan to offer this option in 2022
17% – We don’t plan to offer this option in the foreseeable future
With 82% of our respondents either planning to or already offering their clients the ability to make charitable donations through their business-related fees, we wanted to explore what other professionals in the field were doing to enact similar programs.
“Our company participates in weekly food drives and distribution. Our mission is to provide food to homeless people and we encourage our customers to donate food and also volunteer for the charity. If the customers are not able to donate food, they can pay for their share in the mission.”
—Evelyn Smith, Professional Photographer, Fox Backdrop
“Our customers can donate through our company. We have placed charity boxes in all of our stores, where our customers can put in money. There is no specific amount, anyone can donate however much they want. We have also established a webpage and a helpline for donations. We have partnered with an environmental charity organization, to which our customers’ donations are forwarded. The World Resource Institute is the world’s leading environmental charity. It is a research center to create solutions to provide sustainability for our natural resources.”
—Sonia Navarrow, Founder, Navarro Paving
“I have opened doors to my customers so that they can donate towards a noble cause. We have a sustainable line of products that, when purchased, every dollar goes towards a charity. Consumers are given the freedom to choose a noble cause as per their personal preference.”
—Adam Crossling, Marketing Consultant, Zenzero
15% of U.S. customers donate a portion of their purchases to health and wellness-related charities
The focus in the United States on health and wellness isn’t confined to corporate social activism, and customers who have been living through the pandemic are equally concerned about the mental health impact of the isolation caused by quarantines and social distancing measures as well as the grief caused by the loss of loved ones due to illness. As with corporate donation practices, customers are also concerned with supporting charities that help to offset many of the factors influencing health and mental wellness by removing uncertainty and insecurity about housing and nutritional stability.
13% – Human rights, racial, and gender equity
6% – Housing insecurity
13% – Food insecurity and nutrition support
11% – Youth and education policy organizations
15% – Health and wellness, including mental health support
12% – Environmental sustainability
10% – Animal welfare
5% – Refugee and immigration services
8% – Workforce development/technology accessibility
7% – Transportation accessibility
1% – Other
Meanwhile, 13% of Canadian customers donate part of their purchases to human rights, racial, and gender equity-related charities
In Canada, customers put just as much focus on health and wellness-focused initiatives as they do on improving the environment and addressing social inequalities. Undermining much of this focus on human rights and support of racial- and gender equity-focused charities is an unwelcome rise in ultranationalist groups throughout many of Canada’s allies internationally. Canadians are focused and set on preventing the same rise in their own country.
13% – Human rights, racial, and gender equity
7% – Housing insecurity
11% – Food insecurity and nutrition support
10% – Youth and education policy organizations
13% – Health and wellness, including mental health support
13% – Environmental sustainability
10% – Animal welfare
7% – Refugee and immigration services
7% – Workforce development/technology accessibility
7% – Transportation accessibility
3% – Other
Sustainable business practices in both the United States and Canada extend beyond a simple focus on green office operations and recycling. As our cultural standards and business practices evolve, so must our social action and social awareness initiatives to encompass a more rounded worldview of how businesses and their clients need to impact the communities where they operate. At the pinnacle of most organizations’ social activism is a mix of focus on health and wellness, mental wellness, environmental sustainability, and a need to support basic human rights, especially those related to race and gender equality.
Evolve Your Social Mission in 2022 to Drive Your Future Success
We’ve been dealing with the fallout and impact of the coronavirus pandemic since early 2020, and it’s uncertain at the time of this writing how much longer businesses across the United States and Canada will have to deal with the aftermath or the time it will take to fully recover in the months to come. It’s uncertain whether businesses that have restructured staffing and sales teams will ever return to pre-pandemic levels of staffing, or whether jobs will continue to evolve and adapt to this new paradigm. It’s unclear whether employees will continue to seek out new jobs and pivot roles and industries to find businesses they feel offer them fair compensation and a more evolved employment experience. In short, small business trends continue to confound and challenge decision-makers.
What is clear is that throughout the pandemic, marketing, and B2B service providers have seen their businesses pushed by consumer behavior and purchasing preferences into an increased state of adaptability, having to simultaneously improve and expand their social awareness programs in order to retain and even grow market share.
Whether you’re looking to generate new business or grow business with your current clients, building a social awareness plan for the year, or looking to integrate a volunteering platform or other new technologies to organize your team’s efforts are good starting points for refining your business model. You can learn more about how to expand and structure your corporate social responsibility strategy by connecting with U.S. B2B service providers and Canadian B2B service providers who specialize in public relations management.
UpCity’s Survey Method
UpCity surveyed 600 respondents in the United States and Canada about their takes on small business social awareness policies, practices, and benefits in 2022.
Fifty-four percent of the respondents are male and forty-six percent of respondents are female.
A majority of respondents work at small businesses with 2-5 employees (21%), followed by 51-100 employees (20%), and 11-25 employees (18%).
Twenty-eight percent of the small business respondents are part of a business that has been operating for 3-5 years and thirty-four percent of them earn annual revenue of less than $500,000.