Our history
Doug Fleer and Rian Fried first met at a neighborhood gathering in 1983. The two found that they had strong common interests in social justice, the environment, and financial markets. Within a few months, they formed Fried & Fleer Investments and began publishing a monthly stock-market newsletter that they called The Clean Yield. That publication featured a list of socially screened companies, as well as a model portfolio. With its unique content, The Clean Yield quickly developed a nationwide following among financial professionals as well as individual investors just learning about the emerging field of socially responsible investing.
The Clean Yield’s model portfolio, in particular, drew attention, because it became one of the top-performing model portfolios in the U.S. Before long, subscribers began calling to ask for market trading advice. Seeing the need, Doug and Rian joined up with a third partner, Ben Lovell, and made their advice systematic by adding an asset management service. Clean Yield Asset Management incorporated as a registered investment advisory firm in 1986, and Ben opened a branch office in Portsmouth, N.H.
For a while, the Portsmouth Clean Yield office was co-located with the social mutual fund, Pax World Fund, and our staff performed many of Pax World’s administrative functions through contractual arrangement. When Ben switched jobs in 1996, we took the opportunity to consolidate his office and our office in Stannard, Vermont, in a nearby town, Greensboro.
Our research director, Rick Hausman, started with us part time in 1990 while he was still in his third term in the Vermont House. His presence enabled us to expand our social research, shareholder advocacy, and community investing. Another staff addition came in 2006 with the addition of Dorigen Hofmann, a portfolio manager. Dorigen maintained a small office near her home in Seattle; however, in the spring of 2009, she and her epidemiologist husband, Jon, moved to the Washington, D.C. area where she opened a satellite office. More recently, portfolio manager Eric Becker joined us in October 2009 as our chief investment officer; Valerie Martin became Clean Yield’s office operations associate at our Norwich, Vt. office; and Elizabeth Glenshaw came on board as managing director at the beginning of 2010. Eric was seasoned for sixteen years as a portfolio manager at Trillium Asset Management in Boston, and Elizabeth most recently directed a development team at the Calvert Foundation.