Our evaluations are done using an established set of criteria.

In general, our evaluation criteria are based on the types of impacts to people and the planet that we recognize as being important for that industry and the types of products they make and sell.

Based on our experience, the criteria we select is informed by the best available information from a variety of credible, publicly available sources.

Our criteria is also informed by our education and training as well as our professional expertise

You can learn more about the sources that help inform Hilde evaluation criteria here.

We divide our evaluation criteria into four categories:

1. Ingredient Safety

In general, our ingredient safety criteria are designed to help us determine:

How well does this brand consider the safety of chemicals present in raw materials, ingredients, and manufacturing processes for people and ecosystems?

2. Environmental Impact Reduction

In general, Hilde environmental impacts reduction criteria are designed to help us determine:

How well does this company identify the nature and extent of environmental impacts across their value chain?

Are they taking meaningful steps to address those impacts?

3. Benefits for People

In general, Hilde people benefits criteria are designed to help us determine:

How well does this company identify the nature and extent of impacts (positive and negative) on people and communities across their value chain?

Are they taking meaningful steps to address those impacts?

4. Accountability  

In general, Hilde accountablity criteria are designed to help us determine:

How well does this company integrate safety and sustainability into the way they make decisions?

What policies, processes, practices do they use to hold themselves publicly accountable for their impacts on people and the planet?

We allow for the nuances of each product category based on the information we can find and our professional judgement.

You can read more about the specific kinds of topics criteria here.

The following steps are included in our evaluation process for companies or products that we have identified as a priority.

These steps are carried out by the Hilde internal team of sustainability experts:

1. Perform Initial Evaluation

A sustainability expert conducts research using publicly available information provided by the company on their website or from another reliable public source (i.e. universities, NGOs, or governments) to evaluate company policies and practices against our safety and sustainability criteria using our digital tool.

2. Review Evaluation

The evaluation is reviewed by another sustainability expert. If a discrepancy between the initial score and reviewer score arises, additional research and review is conducted until there is consensus.

‍3. Draft Summary

A summary of the evaluation is completed by the original evaluator to highlight the Company’s efforts we “like” and “opportunities for improvement” based on our research, criteria scoring, and professional expertise.

‍4. Review Summary‍

The summary is reviewed by someone other than the original reviewer.

Sometimes we may choose to engage a company directly during our review to help provide an additional layer of verification.

5. Revise Summary (if necessary)

We may revise our initial evaluation summary if necessary based on our consideration of any additional data or information obtained during our engagement with the company.

Read more about why & how we engage with companies during our evaluation process here.

6. Publish Evaluation

We publicly share the evaluation summary on our website.

7. Reevaluate Regularly

It is our intention to reevaluate companies and products at least every three years or sooner if deemed appropriate.

Along the way, there may be additional steps included in the evaluation process, at the discretion of the expert reviewer, to provide clarity or additional information needed prior to the evaluation actually being published.

Hilde reserves the right to revise, modify, or otherwise adapt our evaluation process as deemed appropriate.

Hilde seeks to apply its evaluation process consistently across all the companies we assess.

That’s why we use the same criteria explained above for companies of all sizes, regions, and types and base our scoring exclusively on publicly available information that we believe is credible.

You can read more about how we research and gather information for our evaluations here.

Hilde evaluations represent a snapshot in time but we also consider requests to make updates to an evaluation if things change over time.

The decision on whether to update the evaluation and the timing of it (prior to 3 years) depends on the circumstances and is solely at Hilde’s discretion.

Hilde uses expert perspectives from sustainability professionals with decades of experience to help interpret information and score criteria.

Find out how we use the results of our company evaluation to assign ratings and status here.

It is our intention to be independent, scientifically accurate, timely, and nuanced in our evaluations.

That said, we are humans who may make mistakes on occasion.

Our commitment to you and your family is to:

• Be transparent about our process
• Quickly fix mistakes if we make them
• Constantly improve the ways we work

You can read more about some of the limitations to our evaluations here.