Starbucks and BP Bespoke Events

This year, two companies, BP and Starbucks, have taken corporate teambuilding to a whole new level by commissioning CARE Challenge to design and run their first in-house charity teambuilding events. To find out about bespoke events for your company click here>> 

We all know how important a good team is to good business. However, think of corporate teambuilding and what often springs to mind is sitting in stuffy office workshops watching slide after slide of meaningless company data. So while it seems that we know we need to foster good corporate team building we just don't necessarily know how to get there in a fresh and creative way.

Our CARE Challenge events are centered around that one thing. Sure, you want to climb a mountain or three but you wouldn't necessarily do it alone. You might work in a big company of hundreds, and you know who Steve in Accounts is but you've never met him. And while Marketing might be located on the same floor as Communications, somehow company culture has meant that the twain just never seem to meet.

Of course, many of our CARE Challenge participating companies recognise this, and see taking part in our events as one way of addressing the issue. Richard Preston, of CARE Challenge regular participants FMC Technologies, told us: I am extremely proud of the team we have here at FMC and know that our strength will see us through both the physical and mental challenge of the event. Team work is at the core of every successful business and I know that our team will stay focused on achieving the end goal and help us to exceed our target of raising over £7000. PricewaterhouseCoopers' Steve Neudegg, Weston Homes and Adam Halford agreed: Steve said: It was a great team building experience and a good way to really get to know the people that we work with every day, Adam added: By its nature it is also a team event, by the end of which a terrific bond is built up within both the individual teams and in fact with all the participants from all the encouragement and banter, during the climbs.

Nevertheless, two very different major UK companies - Starbucks Coffee Company and BP -  whilst no strangers to taking part in CARE Challenge events themselves, decided to take this concept to an altogether different level, by working in partnership with CARE on their very own bespoke charity Challenge events in 2007-8. The very first Starbucks Adventure Challenge took place on 22nd July in the southern region of the Lake District, while the BP Adventure Challenge is due to take place in Spring 2008, also in the Lake District.

The Starbucks Adventure Challenge formed part of the launch of the joint Starbucks and CARE partnership in the UK building on a long-standing relationship with CARE International supporting coffee growing communities around the world. Starbucks Coffee Company in the UK plans to raise 200,000 over the next three years to support CARE's work with coffee-growing communities on water resource initiatives in the rural region of West Harrarghe in Ethiopia. The July Adventure Challenge created great excitement within the company, with 23 Starbucks teams from across the UK rising to the challenge of pitting their physical abilities against each other in a series of mountain biking, canoeing and hiking challenges around Lake Coniston. Collectively they managed to raise £28,000 for CARE.

Operations Services Director, David Argent, who took part in the Starbucks event said:

We were no strangers to taking part in an event for CARE in 2006, 11 teams from across the company's estate took part in the CARE Adventure Challenge in North Wales. For us it was a real opportunity to create a connection between the community work Starbucks does in many of its growing regions, particularly Africa, and the day to day activity that takes place in our stores. The real sense of team work and commitment, linked with the sense of personal achievement each of our partners felt provided the basis for this years challenge which saw 23 teams getting involved.

Since everyone on this year's event was a Starbucks UK partner, there was a degree of competition among some of the teams, and huge motivation to do well. The overriding emotion however is about the great sense of achievement which our partners felt afterwards. This enthusiasm and sense of what can be accomplished when pushed has translated seamlessly into the day to day work environment improved business performance, fostering a positive attitude and commitment.

However, David acknowledges that the experience hasn't just been about fostering great teambuilding within the company, its also about thinking outside the realms of the organisation, and your company's own role in serving its communities. In corporate speak, this is often known as Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR).

We at Starbucks take great pride in our CSR activity across the world, and indeed have a long history of working with CARE. Being able to link our fundraising to specific programmes which directly benefit the growers in Ethiopia creates a tangible link between the store partners on the Challenge and the product they serve to our customers each and every day. It is humbling to think that the relatively small effort the teams put in on the day is often replicated each and every day by farmers in Ethiopia, often just to reach fresh water or education and the CARE team are able to bring this to life in a very powerful message.

I would totally recommend to any other company with a genuine interest in collectively giving something back to the communities they work with.

For the full 2007 Starbucks Adventure Challenge event report click here.

Click here to read an interview with BP on their very first bespoke charity event with CARE, scheduled for Spring 2008.