Thriving, Connected, Resilient Businesses

Aside from new business partnerships, Asha and her team have also forged new nonprofit partnerships since Level. In early 2024, Kula Foods and veritree became partners to plant mangrove trees in Kenya, Asha’s home country, with 1 tree planted after each online order placed. They are collaborating with Flavours of Hope, a cooperative kitchen that provides free culinary space to newcomer immigrant and refugee women to explore cooking, storytelling, and entrepreneurship. Kula is one of the members, and Asha is mentoring women participating in the program. They also recently formalized a new partnership with a local organization that works to expand food access with a focus on culturally relevant foods. Kula is contributing products and food to the organization and exploring ways to further serve the community in the future. “We hope to grow these partnerships as our business grows,” she says. “We have to start somewhere with these dreams. Being in Level helped inspire us to imagine what else we can do and be as a company.”

In 2018, after a personal health journey transformed her relationship with wellness, Ashley Donaldson founded More Life Liquid, a beverage company rooted in community impact. From the beginning, her focus was clear: work closely with BIPOC communities to build bridges to wellness. When she discovered the Level program, she already knew the B Corp logo from product packaging. “Once I started diving into Level and the content, I knew it was what we stand for,” Ashley said. “I wanted to be part of a community that supported that.”


Level became her first real introduction to building a Certified B Corp business. Along the way, it helped her sharpen her vision, connect with mission-aligned partners, and deepen her company’s impact. “This was my first CPG,” she says. “The program gave us a clearer focus, and from that, we’ve gained new partnerships with local wellness spaces, increased local distribution, and been able to hire more people.”


One of the most powerful shifts to come from Ashley’s Level experience was a new approach to hiring—one that put her company’s values at the center. More Life Liquid began partnering with recovery homes for women, offering fair-wage employment to women recovering from trauma and supporting their reintegration into the workforce. Today, women in recovery make up 50% of the company’s team.