When Stonyfield got our start in 1983 there was no national organic standard. In fact, while we operated an organic, biodynamic farm and dairy, even we were not 3rd-party certified.

We started Stonyfield with the multiple missions of providing healthy, clean, nutritious foods, supporting economically and ecologically sustainable family farms, and educating consumers about their power to do good through conscientious purchasing. We helped model and pioneer a movement to use business as a force for good. And over time our loyal consumers helped us prove that this was possible. Today we have a national organic standard that helps ensure our products are produced without harmful pesticides, synthetic fertilizers, antibiotics, or added growth hormones. In 2016 we also became a certified B-Corp to help verify our social and environmental performance. We’re watching our government and some companies reverse course on climate change and sideline vital environmental initiatives. We are concerned with the cancellation of grants that support adoption of renewables and climate-smart agriculture, and protections of vital lands, waterways, and natural habitats.

At the same time, we’re seeing more and more impacts from climate change as our planet continues to warm, approaching the 1.5-degree-Celsius tipping point. Scientists predict more wildfires, extreme weather, and catastrophic biodiversity and ecosystem declines. These impacts threaten our communities, particularly our poorest and most vulnerable populations, and our ability to produce enough healthy foods. Now more than ever, companies need to redouble commitments to take positive action. It’s hard work, and progress isn’t always linear, but we are not wavering in our mission: More than 40 years later, we’re still here to make the world a better, healthier place, and to protect family farmers and future generations.

Sincerely, Gary Hirshberg, Co-Founder,
Chief Organic Optimist, Stonyfield

Stonyfield prioritizes buying milk from a network of small New England organic farms we know and trust — like a family. These farmers share our commitment to organic because of its benefits for the environment, our health, and animal welfare. In 2024, we are happy to announce that nine New England organic farms joined our direct supply team. This expands the organic farmland managed by Stonyfield direct suppliers from 16,000 acres (about twice the area of Chicago O’Hare airport) to 20,000 acres (about the area of Cleveland, Ohio). Stonyfield provides significant support for small farms that join our family, including up to $4,000 of technical assistance each year for all kinds of improvements. We also help organic farms through the Northeast Organic Family Farm Partnership, which works to grow demand in the Northeast for organic dairy products made from organic dairy producers right here in our region. Our new supply farms are located within a few hours from our headquarters in New Hampshire.

In 2024 we completed comprehensive checks to confirm that 100 percent of Stonyfield’s dairy technicians received training on proper animal welfare practices, completing a goal set for 2025. This ensures early compliance with basic animal welfare standards. We also set ambitious new animal welfare goals as our supply chain expands to include as many as 70 organic farms. Stonyfield has established an animal welfare dashboard to help the company monitor and meet these global corporate social responsibility standards. Everybody likes happy cows. 

In 2024 Stonyfield started retrofitting lighting at the Londonderry manufacturing facility, replacing fluorescent lighting on the production floor, in offices, labs, and warehouses with energy-efficient LED lights. The savings are significant: a 60 percent reduction in facility lighting energy use of 696,000 kilowatt hours every year, or the equivalent of taking over 60 homes off the U.S. energy grid. The new lighting is also better for our people, with brighter, more consistent light and less maintenance. I guess you could say, we bring good yogurt to light.

Stonyfield strongly advocates in favor of public policy to support organic farming, including vital research. In 2024, we worked successfully with Sen. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., to include support for organic farmers in the draft farm bill. Baldwin ensured that the bill draft included grants to develop organic market infrastructure, like food processing and storage, to help connect organic farmers with consumers. Although this farm bill draft ultimately did not pass in 2024, we will continue advocating for these kinds of policies. Despite majority opposition in Congress, we fought to preserve $20 billion set aside for climate-smart agriculture as part of the Inflation Reduction Act signed into law in 2022. Also in 2024, we helped convince the USDA to release a second round of funding to help support organic dairy farmers hit by high organic feed costs through the Organic Dairy Market Assistance Program. We will always work to improve rules and regulations that make great food even better.

In 2024 Stonyfield launched a new mono-material design for its YoBaby yogurt pouches. The new design requires 11 percent less plastic than the prior version, with a new lightweighted cap that cuts plastic use by 17 percent. These numbers add up: Our plastic use on YoBaby yogurt pouches in 2024 went down by 10 tons, and manufacturing these lighter pouches reduced our greenhouse-gas emissions on these products by 73 tons compared to plastic use and emissions attributable to the prior design. We did the work with the help of a $300,000 grant from the Dairy Business Innovation Center. This is a great step for YoBaby yogurt. The lighter-weight caps were so successful that we expanded them to more of our pouch products, providing an additional savings of 16 tons of plastic and 53 tons of CO2 emissions.

Stonyfield upgraded the air compressor system at our Londonderry manufacturing facility in 2024, helping us pursue our goals to reduce the direct and indirect greenhouse gas emissions from our flagship plant. Like many manufacturers, we use machines that compress air to power equipment and tools. Air compressors also incidentally generate heat. The new compressors are better in two ways: first, they are more efficient; second, we engineered a system to capture and use that heat byproduct for use in other plant operations, like pre-heating water, or to provide heat for the facility. This project is estimated to reduce energy consumption at the plant by 624,677 kWh per year. Every bit helps.

Stonyfield supports healthy communities, including the New England towns we call home. We made over $1 million in charitable donations in 2024 (including both cash and product donations) to help support the communities and people we love.  In 2024, the Organization for Refugee and Immigrant Success (ORIS) received $30,000 to support their work connecting refugee and immigrant communities with fresh, healthy food — including $20,000 directly to their mobile market program. We also donated $10,000 to support the New Hampshire Conservation Law Foundation’s environmental justice initiatives in Manchester and Nashua. These are just a few examples of Stonyfield spreading the love locally. 

Stonyfield’s absolute greenhouse-gas emissions increased from 2022 to 2023 as our company grew and markedly increased the organic acreage managed by our supplier farms. This rise of nearly seven percent in emissions also corresponded with increasing Stonyfield sales. We know that our emissions reduction targets are ambitious, and our progress toward meeting those goals is nonlinear — particularly as we get bigger. We regularly review and refine our plans to meet emission-reduction targets, with a careful eye toward long-term goals. In late 2024, we updated our targets to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions in coordination with the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi), an international collaboration to prevent global warming from surpassing the 1.5 degrees Celsius mark, a goal from the Paris Agreement. 

Using 2022 as a baseline, we have committed to a 36 percent reduction by 2030 across the areas impacted by the SBTi. We have also committed to zero deforestation across our supplier network by the end of 2025. The SBTi has validated that the science-based greenhouse-gas emissions reductions targets submitted by Stonyfield conform with the SBTI Criteria and Recommendations (Criteria version 5.2) and the SBTi Forest, Land and Agriculture Guidance.

One example of the steps we are taking to advance our long-term goals is helping our direct-supply farms complete a greenhouse-gas assessment once every three years. This effort helps monitor and identify opportunities for emissions reductions among our organic farm suppliers, thereby supporting our deep, long-term commitment to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions across our operations, from our direct-supply organic farms all the way to the breakfast table.