The Hershey Co. Takes Top Spot Among Female-Friendly Companies

HERSHEY, Pa. — The Hershey Co. earned the top honor among Forbes' list of the "World's Top Female Friendly Companies," spearheading a roster of 300 honorees.

To compile the list, Statista surveyed 85,000 women in 40 countries, who were asked to rate their employers' performance on gender-related criteria and their willingness to recommend their employer to others. They were also asked to evaluate other employers in their respective industries. Statista also asked respondents to rate companies based on their corporate responsibility, marketing campaigns and public perception, as related to gender equality.

According to Hershey, being recognized at the top of this list by Forbes illustrates firsthand its longstanding commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI), with the mission serving as a critical component to the company's long-term success.

"Guided by The Pathways Project, we continue to advance progress around gender equity — a core component of our greater DEI strategy," said Alicia Petross, chief diversity officer of The Hershey Co. "At Hershey, we are more than female friendly — we are female forward. From internal initiatives, such as pay equity, our hiring and development strategy and women's business resource group, to external initiatives, such as the International Women's Day HerSHEy's bar and our ongoing community engagement efforts to support all youth, this recognition is a testament to our continued commitment to gender equity across our organization."

In 2020, Hershey co-created The Pathways Project with employees to catalyze courageous conversations, propel progress and put rigorous DEI goals in place. This recognition comes on the tails of the company's 2020 milestone of achieving a dollar-for-dollar aggregate pay equity for both salaried women and people of color in the United States.

By 2025, The Pathways Project plans to achieve aggregate dollar-for-dollar pay equity for salaried employees worldwide and seeks to increase representation of Hershey's employee base so that 47 to 50 percent of employees are women and 30 to 40 percent are people of color.

Similarly, the company aspires to have 15 to 22 percent People Leader roles occupied by people of color and 40 to 42 percent by women.

In addition to pay equity, Hershey has made several other notable outcomes to support women, including:

• The formation of a women's business resource group;
• The expansion of family-focused benefits like fertility benefits and paid paternity leave; and
• The establishment of career development programs for underrepresented groups.

As reported in Hershey's 2020 Sustainability Report, the company has 48.1 percent gender diversity around the world, 37.4 percent of people leaders globally are women, and the Board of Directors has 42 percent gender diversity.

Pennsylvania-based The Hershey Co. has more than 90 brands around the world that drive more than $8 billion in annual revenues, including such iconic brand names as Hershey's, Reese's, Kit Kat, Jolly Rancher, Ice Breakers, SkinnyPop, and Pirate's Booty.