Bayard, a company with a mission

2023, a new stage in the group’s commitment to society: Bayard becomes a mission-driven company

 

After adopting a statutory raison d’être in November 2021, the Bayard group is broadening its potential for societal impact and becoming a mission-driven company in December 2022. This decision confirms the group’s commitment, reaffirms its uniqueness and places it in a new dynamic at the service of the common good.

The status of mission-driven company was introduced by the PACTE Act in 2019. For a company, this means publicly affirming its raison d’être and the objectives it has set itself to pursue in the course of its business. Bayard has therefore defined three major social and environmental objectives that help to put its raison d’être into action and express its commitment.

This decision, a pioneer in the press and publishing sector, anchors and secures its project while opening up new fields of innovation and alliances for the development of its activities and their potential impact.

The Bayard group’s mission expresses both its identity and the purpose of its corporate project, which celebrates its 150th anniversary this year. 150 years of a unique cultural adventure, constantly renewed.

 

As a Catholic publisher, Bayard seeks to welcome and accompany all audiences at every stage of their lives.
Together, we want to live our world to the full. To help everyone feel connected to themselves and to others.
We are committed to the common good, concerned for nature and future generations. We believe in the liberating power of accurate information, imagination and creation that nourish the soul and life.
Let’s create fertile links!

 

1. In the interests of equal opportunities and access to culture, we want to open up our mission of education and information to as many people as possible./li>
2. In the face of urgent environmental, social and societal issues, we want each of our projects to contribute to the emergence of a desirable shared future and to give people the capacity to act.
3. We believe in the power of an inner and spiritual life, and we want to help people connect beyond their differences through listening and dialogue.

On the one hand, it’s about preserving and updating our uniqueness, maintaining consistency between our mission and our activities, expanding some of our actions and developing others. But it’s also about making our existing initiatives clearer, monitoring their impact more closely and opening up new fields of action or exploring new models that combine social, societal, environmental and economic impact.

Some of the actions we choose to implement may require alliances or resources that we do not have within the company, particularly in order to reach new or ‘excluded’ audiences and to further extend the potential impact of our actions.

[With this in mind, we have decided to create an endowment fund, a new legal vehicle to contribute to the deployment of some of our commitments, and to extend and amplify our Bayard mission. The purpose of this fund is to support socially innovative actions that help to create links and combat the fragmentation of society[/textprimary].

Uniquely positioned in France, the Bayard fund “Agir pour une société du lien” is based on the company’s values and expertise. It encourages grassroots initiatives with a proven impact model and the potential for spin-off and replication. It can also intervene upstream, in the field of research and studies of innovative projects.

Thanks to the actions supported or designed with others, the fund enables Bayard to forge new partnerships with public interest and social economy players at the forefront of societal innovation. It supports Bayard in the deployment of its mission.

To the Bayard Endowment Fund page