• SB Stocks - Sustainable Business.com's list grouped by type of product
• Clean-Technology Stock Tracker

Basic Sites for Company Research

Triple Bottom Line Sources of Company Information

Socrates - KLD's reports on social, environment and ethical aspects of companies for the investment community. From KLD Research & Analytics, co-founded by Amy Domini.

CorporateRegister.com - a directory of corporate non-financial reports, including Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), sustainability, environmental and social reports.  Access is free, but you must register.

GreenBiz.com Corporate Web Sites - List of Greenbiz.com 301 exemplar companies linking directly to the companies' information on environmental/sustainable practices. If your company is not at this site, search Google to locate their Internet home page.

CERES - Coalition for Environmentally Responsible Economies - members submit reports on how they implement these principles.  CERES also awards companies with the best reports.

Domini Social 400 Index companies - click Domini 400 Social Index on left for very brief reports on a corporation's social strengths and concerns.

The International Corporate Environmental Reporting Site - EnviroReporting - the tabs at the top of the page provides links to sustainability reports for corporations around the world. Browse by name, sector or country.

Responsible Shopper - search a company to find out issues for which they have been praised and criticized and compare it with related companies. Ratings are provided by the Council on Economic Priorities, now Social Accountability International and may not be current. A similar site, Ideals Work, allows you to develop a list of companies by specific product (i.e. women's dresses) according to your social & environmental priorities.

While Babson does not have access to these reports, the following organizations review corporations for institutional investors:

• Investor Responsibility Research Center - through their Corporate Environmental Profiles Database
  

These government agencies review companies brought to their attention:

• OSHA: Occupational Health and Safety Administration
• National Labor Relations Board (NLRB)
  

Basic Company Sources for Triple Bottom Line Analysis

Hoover's - covers public, private and international companies with brief history, competitors and key links.

Thomson Research - most complete site for SEC filings for US and international companies. The 10K annual report, or 20F for international companies, provide detailed financials.  See also Thomson ONE Banker for brief M&A data and more.

Investext Plus- analysts reports on publicly-held companies and industries.

Factiva- search 8000 U.S. and international newspapers and trade journals for information on private and public companies.

EBSCOHost - search Business Source Complete for Datamonitor Company Profiles and a wide range of articles and reports, plus Academic Search Premier for technical and ethical topics.

General Business File ASAP - search for for general topics and environmental aspects of a company.

If you need more information, try the following databases: 

• LexisNexis Academic - use for private company data (Business > Company Profiles and Company Dossier) and for articles in the New York Times and other sources.
• ProQuest - for detailed indexing to refine your topic. Also good for private companies. 
• RDS Business Reference Suite  - for market data.  Use for private companies as well. 
• NewsBank - for coverage of smaller local companies

Researching Technologies and New Products

If you have a new product idea, consult the Business Plan Research research guide for industry and market sources. We recommend that you consult with a reference librarian for a more productive start to your research. To research your product's technology, consult the following sources:

Access Science - McGraw-Hill's encyclopedia for introductory information and diagrams.

EBSCOHost - search Business Source Complete and Academic Search Premier for  a wide range of articles and reports on technical and other topics.

Expanded Academic ASAP - Search basic environmental, science and technology journals.

FirstSearch - After using the above databases and depending on your topic, you may want to search the following databases: GEOBase, Agricola, BioDigest (Biology Digest) or WilsonFullText.

Olin College Library - The library of Olin College is open to Babson students and their books can be checked out using your Babson ID card. See their web page for Monday - Friday hours; they also recommend that you call ahead to ensure that assistance will be available. At their library workstations you can search and retrieve articles from several engineering databases, such as Engineering Village 2 and ScienceDirect. Note that FirstSearch databases are available at Babson.

For patent information, use the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office site. For all patents of a particular company, search by Assignee Name.

Accounting and Reporting Guidelines

Global Reporting Initiative - provides guidelines for reporting on the economic, environmental, and social performance, initially for corporations and eventually for any business, governmental, or non-governmental organisation. This initiative was begun in 1997 by CERES and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). The site provides a list of companies following their guidelines.

AccountAbility: The Institute for Social and Ethical AccountAbility (ISEA) -  an "international membership organization committed to ... developing the competencies of individuals in social and ethical accountability and sustainable development." Their work includes the development of standards and guiding principles including AA 1000 and its AA 1000 Series revisions. They also play a significant role in the development of the Global Reporting Initiative and Project SIGMA, the British government's sustainability management guidelines. For an introduction to these efforts begin with their About Us section. You may need to register to access many of their free publications.

AccountAbililty 1000 (AA 1000), as described by Social Audit, was developed as a "basic standard of of responsibilitiy, aiming at providing quality to the accounting, auditing and ethic reporting process, in order to favour a sustainable development path." AA 1000 is closely aligned with SA 8000 (Social Accountablility) standard for workplace conditions, GRI on economic and environment issues, and ISO 14001 on environmental issues.

Social Accountability International - SAI, formerly known as the Council on Economic Priorities Accreditation Agency (CEPAA) has developed Social Accountability 8000 (SA8000), a standard for workplace conditions and a system for independently verifying factories’ compliance.

Environmental Management: The ISO 14000 Family of International Standards

CERES - Coalition for Environmentally Responsible Economies - a coalition of 80 environmental, investor, and advocacy groups working together for a sustainable future. Fifty organizations have endorsed CERES principles, a ten-point code of environmental conduct, and CERES links to reports on how they implement these principles.  CERES also awards companies with the best reports. 

Environmental Management Accounting Research & Information Center (EMARIC) - includes a number of reports. Search the library to retrieve online documents. Site also includes US EPA documents on Environment Accounting including case studies and the An Introduction to Environmental Accounting as a Business Management Tool: Key Concepts and Terms.

Social Audit - Italian site.

Capital Markets

Echoing Green - "is a non-profit Foundation that offers full-time Fellowships to emerging social entrepreneurs. Our Foundation applies a venture capital approach to philanthropy by providing seed money and technical support to individuals creating innovative public service projects that seek to catalyze positive social change."

Investors Circle - Angel network.

Eco Trust- Provides venture funding through their Natural Capital Fund.

Clean Water Technologies, Inc - Promotes green technologies

Battelle - Developer and incubator for new technologies.

Sustainable Business.com Business Connections - Lists sources for Venture Capital and financing for sustainable businesses.

Galante's Venture Capital and Private Equity Directory - A networked CD-ROM that allows you to develop a list of venture capital firms according to various criteria.

VentureXpert Web - screen VC firms by various criteria or look up a start-up company to find out their funding sources.

Green Mutual Funds

Social Funds, Inc - Information resource center on social mutual funds, community investing, shareowner action and daily social investment news.

Social Investment Forum - This "site offers comprehensive information, contacts & resources on socially responsible investing."

Trillium Asset Management - Manager of the oldest social mutual fund, The Advocacy Fund.

Green Century Funds - Managed by Green Century Capital Management Co., Boston

Winslow Green Growth Fund - Managed by Winslow Management Company in Boston.

Related Sources

EPA Models - Directory of sites. Also includes a list of Serious Critiques of Social Investing.

The International Corporate Environmental Reporting Site - Provides links to company lists from various countries, international news on environmental reporting, and more.

CCInet: Corporate Community Involvement - Charities Aid Foundation site with benchmarking data and links to corporate web sites on reports of community involvment and charitable giving by corporations.

EBIC: Environmental Background Information Center - Particularly valuable is their Links page with its comprehensive list of sources for researching corporate behavior.

This resource guide is a collaborative effort of Steven J. Cox MBA 03, Frances Nilsson, Alan Krentzel, Elisabeth Shedd, Professors Natalie Taylor and Neal Harris, and many others. We welcome additional input.