OAKLAND, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Give Something Back Office Supplies, a for-profit company that has donated more than 75% of its profits to community groups, celebrates 20 years of business in 2011. For the first time, its annual donations, from sales in 2010, have topped a half a million dollars ($511,980). Total donations since the company’s inception will soon exceed $5 million.
“When Mike Hannigan and I founded GSB in Mike’s living room in 1991,” said GSB co-founder and CEO Sean Marx, “it seemed like a strange idea to most people. ‘Why would a company give its profits away?’ they’d ask,” continued Marx. “Well, why not? What better way could there be to make a living, doing what you know how to do best, and at the same time supporting the world you live in?”
Hannigan, who had worked in the business products industry for over a decade, came up with the idea for GSB while grocery shopping one evening. “I was a bachelor, picking up what bachelors eat, pasta sauce and spaghetti, “ laughed Hannigan, “when I saw a jar of Newman’s Own. A light bulb went off. I’d always done community work outside of work, but I thought, ‘If Newman can do it, why can’t the idea work for office supplies, too?”
The idea not only worked, but helped GSB become California’s largest independent office supplier, with annual sales of almost $30 million. GSB also became a leader in the sustainable business movement. Hannigan speaks at business schools and conferences worldwide, and he and Marx have created programs to influence their suppliers, making them greener and more philanthropic.
GSB, which provides more than 40,000 office products from paper clips to furniture, has offices throughout California, with operations in Oregon and Washington, and plans to expand in 2011, tripling sales in the next five years. GSB added a new tagline last year, “Where Value Meets Values®”, to answer customers’ questions about whether they have to pay more to give something back.
“They absolutely don’t,” said Marx. “We meet or beat big box store prices. If we didn’t we wouldn’t be so successful.”
GSB has been featured in the San Francisco Chronicle, Inc., Forbes, and many other media and has won dozens of honors. For more information, please visit www.givesomethingback.com, or call 510.635.5500.