“We - the mass of common men and women in all countries - also compose the world's market. To sell to us is the ultimate aim of the world's business. Hence it is ourselves as consumers who stand in a central relation to all the economies of the world, like the king in his kingdom. As producers we go unto a particular factory, farm or mine, but as consumers we are set by nature thus to give leadership, aim and purpose to the whole economic world. That we are not kings, but serfs in the mass, is due to our failure to think and act together as consumers and so to realise our true position and power.”
(Percy Redfern, The Consumers' Place in Society, 1920).

Most people, though they may broadly support many of the issues, will have some areas of particular concern. Because of this we aim to provide information in a way which enables people to make decisions based on their own priorities.
Breaking the information down into clear categories is one way we do this. Another way is via the Customise Ratings feature of the website.

The Company Rating is based on the subtraction of all the corporate responsibility categories in which the database holds current criticisms from a baseline number. Therefore if a company has received criticisms in the Animal Testing (1 point) and Workers Rights (1point) categories, its ethiscore will be 12. [14 (baseline) minus 2 categories = 12]
If the company had a lesser criticism under, say, Workers Rights (0.5 points) then its ethiscore would be 14 minus 1.5 = 12.5
The fifteenth point is for ‘Company Ethos’ - a positive Corporate Responsibility category - which gives an additional point to companies who, for example, only sell organic products.

The Product Rating is based on five positive attributes which a product may have. Positive Product Sustainability ratings mean that points are added to a company ethiscore. Therefore if a 12 point company is listed as selling an organic (1point) and fairtrade (1 point) Tea, then that Tea product would receive an ethiscore of 12+2 = 14.
ethiscore website users can get access to the full text of product sustainability rating stories by clicking on the product name in the ethiscore tables.

The un-customised ethiscore rates all the categories equally, and we fully expect subscribers to use the Customise Ratings area of Corporate Critic to generate ratings which best reflect their own organisational priorities.

All ratings and ethiscores are based only on information published in the last five years. Detailed information on how we rate companies in each category appears on the Category Rating page of Corporate Critic.

Each abstract is fully referenced to a particular publication, permitting users to explore and follow up stories in more detail.

Our researchers in Manchester add new stories to the database on a daily basis. These are uploaded onto Corporate Critic and scores recalculated nightly.

Because of the ongoing nature of this behaviour-monitoring process, we do not systematically check each story or rating with companies prior to publication. Many of the ratings or stories will have been published before in Ethical Consumer magazine. We encourage companies to contact us if they believe a story or rating is in error and we will always address the issues raised.

Significant effort is made with Corporate Critic to maintain the integrity and accuracy of information. Each company is assigned to its UHC (Ultimate Holding Company) but frequent global mergers, takeovers and acquisitions mean that company group information can be of an advisory nature only.

Of course, accurate ownership information is of the utmost importance to us at ECIS, and we make every effort to monitor significant changes. If you discover information which you believe is incorrect, please contact us and we can make changes within 24 hours if necessary.