It ain’t easy being green these days – especially if you’re an independent green business.

A recent poll by the website Treehugger.com (ironically, this once-independent site is now owned by the Discovery Channel) found that 35 per cent of consumers take their business elsewhere when corporations acquire their once-revered brands.

Skeptics of responsible retailing can easily suggest that small companies have simply reached their expiration date – unfortunate hippie victims of corporate Darwinism. But these partnerships can help bring ethical activities into the mainstream.

“We’re fortunate,” says Sean Greenwood, spokesperson for Ben and Jerry’s. “We could have had a lot of businesses that could have bought us and [closed us down]. But they didn’t do that. And I applaud them for that and for recognizing and understanding that that there’s a value in keeping the folks who are trying to hold on to what’s really important: the essence of Ben and Jerry’s.”

In April 2000, the Anglo-Dutch Unilever NV announced it would buy flagging Ben and Jerry’s stocks for $43.50 a share, a large premium over the previous day’s closing price of $34.93.

Even though the initial takeover caused factory closings, job losses, and management changes, Greenwood says that his company has helped change Unilever.

“There’s been a good give and take, back and forth with the organizations,” he says. “It feels like this is a good fit.”

But co-founder Jerry Greenfield told the UK’s Green Futures magazine in 2006 that he doesn’t feel that fit with Ben and Jerry’s anymore.

“I have no responsibility and no authority in the company,” he said. “I have my good name. I have an ability to influence things I want to, and to not be interested in things I’m not interested in. That’s the extent of my role.”

He went on to add, though, that influence does exist.

“I was skeptical about this supposed ‘transport of values’ from Ben & Jerry’s to Unilever, but it has happened to some degree,” Greenfield observed.

Kevin Ranney, Managing Partner and Director of Research at Jantzi Research, says that positive transfers from the acquired company to the acquirer are difficult to quantify.

“That’s one of the reasons why we’re not really excited to see these acquisitions occur,” he says. “The reality is that what Ben and Jerry’s was all about is now buried deeply within a massive corporate structure, and it has relatively little impact on anyone’s assessment of Unilever.”

Sean Greenwood says that while customers understand there has been a management change, they still support the ice cream.

“I don’t think people say, ‘Wow, this pint today in January 2003 is different than the December pint of 2002.’ I think they are saying Ben and Jerry’s has continued to be a Ben and Jerry’s organization and product throughout our years.”

The proof is in the pudding – or ice cream, as it were. Ben and Jerry’s announced in 2006 that it would be expanding its fair trade ingredients to include Fair Trade Certified coffee, vanilla, and cocoa, and it was also the first national American food manufacturer to move towards a total transition of its products to “Certified-Humane” cage-free eggs.

Nevertheless, the Ben and Jerry’s experience has served as a warning sign to other firms.

Gary Hirshberg, CEO of Stonyfield Farm Yogurt, felt he had a moral obligation to give his loyal shareholders an exit strategy. But he was wary of giving up too much control, and did not want to go public.

Between 2001 and 2003, Hirshberg formed a unique partnership with French food and beverage company Groupe Danone that maintained the existing management. Danone owns 85 per cent of the company’s stock.

“Danone was very enlightened,” says Hirshberg when asked why the company agreed to such a deal. “They recognized that organic is the future, but they realized they didn’t have any native or core expertise in the area.”

Hirshberg has “no regrets” about the partnership, citing Danone’s flexibility and commitment to sustainability.

“Part of the reason I partnered with Danone was not just their willingness to do all the things I asked for, but the more I got to know, the more impressed I was with their sustainability initiatives,” he says.

There has been a great deal of positive knowledge transferred between Danone and Stonyfield. Advised by Stonyfield, Danone created a climate footprint for its beverage business; Stonyfield has also launched three organic ventures through Danone.

Hirshberg says Stonyfield has helped prompt Danone’s increased sustainability reporting.

“We’ve also emboldened them to speak a little more openly and take credit for the things they are doing,” he says. “Stonyfield has demonstrated to them the power and strength in sharing a story.”

Stonyfield has also influenced Danone’s infrastructure. When Stonyfield needed to build its own industrial water pretreatment plant, Hirshberg wanted to build an anaerobic biogas digester – but Danone preferred for them to build an aerobic facility that would create sludge.

“So I had to raise the flag, and mount an assault, and in the end I was successful in persuading them that if there was ever a time to experiment with a new technology, this would be the time and place,” he explains.

Hirshberg says the facility is energy self-sufficient, and that Danone is considering building more.

But not all takeover stories are as heartwarming.

L’Oreal’s acquisition of The Body Shop in March 2006 spurred debate and protest amongst its loyal consumer base. Animal cruelty campaign Naturewatch asked consumers to boycott The Body Shop now that parent L’Oreal tests on animals.

Consumers were also concerned about the Body Shop’s new affiliation with Nestle, which owns 26.4 per cent of L’Oreal. Nestle is the subject of a long-standing boycott due to its marketing of breast milk substitutes in developing countries, which is in breach of the 1981 World Health Organization’s code on the subject. Nestle also has a commanding share of the world water bottle market, and has been criticized for removing water from local watersheds for bottling purposes.

Nonetheless, Pierre Simoncelli, L’Oreal’s Director of Sustainable Development, believes that the union is “a synergy of expertise.”

“The position of The Body Shop is a position which I respect a lot,” he says when asked about animal testing. “The problem is that this position is absolutely perfect as long as you do not come up with new innovative products, and as long as the authorities don’t ask for the reevaluation of [the safety of] ingredients.”

Simoncelli says that L’Oreal’s commitment to science and innovation will not come at the expense of the Body Shop brand, saying that growth “has to be achieved in strict adherence and compliance to their values.”

One smaller green company that’s managed to stay independent is Body Shop competitor Lush Cosmetics.

Mark Constantine, founder and CEO of Lush as well as former partner to recently deceased Body Shop founder Anita Roddick, is disappointed by the trend towards conglomeration, especially because he has warded off his own takeover attempts “because I keep going out there telling people to bugger off.”

Constantine even tried to buy The Body Shop when it was for sale but “only someone like L’Oreal would offer them what they wanted,” he explains.

“There’s nothing more bloody irritating than supporting something for a long time and then find it’s benefiting someone that you didn’t want to benefit,” he says. “I don’t know that a lot of greenwash and bullshit is what someone is looking for.”

“From an investor’s point of view, there is a loss of an opportunity to invest in a company that is an [ethical] leader,” says Ranney.

Constantine is “gobsmacked” by the $925 million USD sale of Burt’s Bees to Clorox, which netted five times more than its projected sales for 2007. This highlights the willingness of large firms to pay attractive premiums for green businesses – and the flaws in the current financial and policy climate for small businesses.

The best way to allow green independents to remain independent, Constantine says, is to create a financial model that rewards growth without takeover.

“The only way you’re going to make large, fully sustainable businesses with strong ethics is to have mechanisms in place to get bigger without getting gobbled up.”

These mechanisms are slowly emerging.

B Lab, a Pennsylvania-based non-profit organization, has developed a certification rating of “B” (for benefit) to rate companies. To qualify as a B Corporation, candidates must meet comprehensive and transparent social and environmental standards, and amend corporate governing documents to incorporate the interests of shareholders, employees, and the community – thereby institutionalizing these values for the future.

The hope is that this rating system will help to separate greenwashed companies from those with truly responsible business practices, as well as provide a large collective market presence that can be promoted on a wide scale by B Lab.

Peter ter Weeme, Principal at Vancouver-based Junxion Strategy Inc. and former Vice-President, Communications and Marketing at Mountain Equipment Co-op, believes that co-operatives are another possible solution to creating a self-sustaining business.

“It’s a model that does emphasize more accountability to the stakeholders and as a result of that, to the community,” he says, citing his experiences in the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy, where one-third of the economic activity is co-op-based and inhabitants enjoy a high standard of living.

While established businesses may find it difficult to convert to a co-operative structure, Employee Stock Ownership Plans and stock options can “give responsibility to the people who most benefit from current and future innovation: the company’s workers,” Gil Friend, President and CEO of consulting firm Natural Logic, told magazine Sustainable Industries in December 2007.

Joel Makower, Executive Editor of environmental business site Greenbiz.com, agrees that the responsibility to maintain a company’s green values is shared.

“Some people would lay the blame on the part of the giant corporations for diluting a progressive company’s initiatives, but the responsibility rests equally on the entrepreneur’s side,” he says.

“It’s not always a case of big is bad. In some cases, big is necessary.”

ter Weeme agrees.

“Trying to [get big] yourself can be extremely limiting,” he says. “It comes down to the exact mission of the organization – are you trying to effect change at a really large level, or are you satisfied with making change at a smaller, local level?”

Ranney of Jantzi is skeptical of whether smaller companies can go it alone when the prospects of growth and liquidity are being dangled so attractively.

“As far as maintaining independence, I’m not sure that there is a way,” he says. “The market is what it is, and if people are willing to sell their shares, if somebody offers enough, people will sell.”

Lush’s Constantine agrees.

“Very few people can resist that,” he says. “And it’s reasonable to say that the people who do resist it are probably fools.”