Not much wiggle room for 'fair trade'

Ben and Jerry's announced this week that all their products will be "fair trade" by 2013. Co-Founder Jerry Greenfield said,

“Fair Trade is about making sure people get their fair share of the pie. The whole concept of Fair Trade goes to the heart of our values and sense of right and wrong. Nobody wants to buy something that was made by exploiting somebody else.” (See full article).

Sourcing certified "fair trade" ingredients is something we believe in strongly and we're pushing our suppliers to incorporate fair trade (and organic) as much as possible.

The rub for us is that we're trying to keep our retail prices reasonable AND we don't yet have any economies of scale to make purchasing a high % of fair trade/organic ingredients viable, so we have to compromise.

For now, to get in the game, we plan to incorporate as much fair trade and organic as we can afford to (e.g. maintain a sensible margin), and as we grow and gain purchasing economies, we'll increase the % of fair trade/organic in our products.

Hopefully, as more p.c. brands seek out these ingredients, reliable supply chains will emerge and prices will start coming down, helping "green" the personal care supply chain, and mirroring what's happening in the food arena.

Either way, it's great to see Ben and Jerrys, now a global player, take the lead on being a responsible business, again.