Introduction
Climate Club is a Sustainability Success Platform that helps sustainability leaders deliver breakthrough sustainability and financial value by automating Scope 3 data collection, generating critical insights, and driving targeted actions across key departments, teams and roles. Their clients and partners include major players like Bain & Company, Meta, Lyft and Google Nest.
As a company that helps organizations translate sustainability plans into action, it’s no surprise that Climate Club wanted to ensure their own employees had 401(k) options that matched their values and mission.
Company Overview
- Industry: Climate Tech
- Company size: 11-50 employees
- Headquarters: New York, New York
- Founded: 2021
The Story of Climate Club
Climate Club was started by former college roommates Adam Braun and Phil Charm who were determined to create a better world for their children. They realized that many large companies have critical sustainability goals but lacked a way to operationalize their plans, especially when it came to gathering Scope 3 data, generating insights from disparate data sets, and scaling a system of cross-functional action. To solve this, Climate Club built a technology platform and expert-led services that sustainability teams can use to close data gaps and drive successful programs.
In 2022, Climate Club publicly launched and closed a $6.5M seed round raised from XYZ Venture Capital, Vestigo Ventures, Red Sea Ventures, MCJ Collective, Climate Capital and additional strategic investors.
Since that exciting announcement, Climate Club has expanded their product offering and grown their team while working with leading companies.
The Opportunity Climate Club Faced
Climate Club’s mission is to close the gap between climate-related intention and action.
As a growing, VC backed startup, the founders wanted to offer employees, and potential new talent, access to a competitive 401(k) plan. This presented an opportunity to enhance their benefits package and set up a 401(k) plan that not only aligns with their company mission, but contributes to solving climate change.
Why Climate Club Chose Carbon Collective
Climate Club wanted to ensure their employees had 401(k) options that aligned to their company’s values and mission. This meant that it was essential for employees to have high quality, sustainable investment choices for their 401(k)s.
The majority of 401(k) providers offer some climate friendly options by adding one or two basic “ESG” (Environmental, Social, and Governance) funds. These funds not only tend to have higher fees that are passed on to investors, but oftentimes still invest in fossil fuel companies. This is not a good solution for those who want climate-friendly options in their 401(k) portfolios.
To align its 401(k) benefit with its mission, Climate Club turned to Carbon Collective.
The key factors that convinced Climate Club to work with Carbon Collective included:
- Ability to offer green, sustainable portfolio options — Employees have all of the options typically available to them in a 401(k) plan, and they have the option to invest in Carbon Collective’s climate-focused target date fund portfolios. These sustainable portfolios are diversified, low cost, fully divested from fossil fuel companies, and hold investments in companies building climate solutions.
- Dedicated, high quality support and onboarding — Carbon Collective’s Head of 401(k) Operations worked closely with Climate Club’s team each step of the way. Many other 401(k) plans that serve startups and small businesses are focused on automation and low touch client support.
- The Carbon Collective team — In addition to having a dedicated 401(k) expert to help well beyond just onboarding, our team here at Carbon Collective is a big reason why clients like Climate Club choose us!
The Carbon Collective team also offers investing education to help engage and inform employees so they can make the most of their 401(k) benefits.
The Results
“Every employee knows that we’re truly living our mission by offering Carbon Collective’s climate-focused 401(k)s within the options they can select from, and that makes a real difference when recruiting top talent.” — Adam Braun, CEO at Climate Club
Climate Club’s sustainable 401(k) plan is now a key part of their employee benefits. Here are a few key perks that Climate Club offers its team:
- Unlimited PTO with mandatory minimums
- Fully remote
- Annual budget to invest in education and personal sustainability
- Industry leading health insurance plans
- Equity incentive plan
A mission-aligned 401(k) plan that offers sustainable, smart investment options fit right in the mix.
As an employer, you have a responsibility to your team to give them the right tools to equip themselves for the climate transition. There's no better 401(k) partner for this than Carbon Collective. —Phil Charm, Co Founder of Climate Club
The team at Carbon Collective is excited to partner with Climate Club to ensure that their employees have investment options that focus on solving climate change and extend their sustainability mission.
Interested in learning more about what Climate Club is working on? Learn how to join them in accelerating the climate transition.
Get Started with Sustainable 401(k) Plans
Carbon Collective is here to answer all of your questions about setting up a sustainable 401(k) for your company. Schedule a Free 401(k) Strategy Session with our Chief Investment Officer.
