Browsing: Get Involved!

The hot weather has been beating down all week, and I don’t know about everyone else, but my thoughts have been turning to picnics, barbeques and enjoying myself in the open air.

There’s the perfect opportunity to get involved in this summery vibe coming up – put the 19th of July into your diary - the nationwide ‘Big Lunch’ is coming right to your doorstep! Well, only if you choose to get involved, but we think that this countrywide picnic sounds like a great plan.

The idea is that two weeks tomorrow, millions of us throughout the UK will choose to sit down and have lunch together, wherever we fancy. It’s a great excuse for a street party, and a wonderful way to have a fun day with family, friends and neighbours. Just register on the Big Lunch website - www.thebiglunch.com -  to plot your event on the Big Lunch map, sort the food and get the invites out, and you’ll be good to go.

We’ve teamed up with the lovely folks at Divine Chocolate to devise a The Big Lunch Fair Trade Hamper to make sure your party goes with a swing.  It’s designed to take away the hard work by creating your picnic for you - complete with delicious sweet treats as well as something healthier to munch on, not to forget drinks for adults as well as the kids. In fact all you really need to add is the sandwiches!

We’d love to know if you’re planning to get involved in the Big Lunch – where are you, who are you inviting, and how are you bribing the weatherman…?

Image via: foodforlife.org.uk

Sustrans, the UK’s leading sustainable transport charity, has just launched its new campaign. It’s one you can all get involved in and maybe win some great prizes.

Swap just one car trip between 29th June - 4th July ‘09 and walk, cycle, take public transport or car - share instead. This is the week to join with thousands of others and Change Your World.

If we all pull together, this one small action could reduce car pollution by 10%, giving us healthier journeys, cleaner air and quieter streets.

We’ve contributed a £100 EthicalSuperstore.com voucher as a prize too, so if it’s free stuff you want then head to their website www.changeyourworld.org.uk.

It’s that time of year again - judging for the fourth annual Triodos Women in Ethical Business Awards is under way, and here at Ethical Superstore we are delighted that three of the finalists are business-women we have been supporting for years.

Anne MacCaig, chief executive of Cafedirect, has been nominated in the Ethical Business Awards category. Cafedirect’s Fairtrade labelled coffees and tea were among the first products seen on the virtual Ethical Superstore shelves, and since then the brand has grown into a nationally recognised name. Anne’s commitment to generating social and environmental benefits for grower communities deserve the recognition given in this finalist position, a worthy winner of the title.

Sarah Brooks and Susi Lennox and their company Yes Pure Intimacy, the only range of organic intimate lubricants and moisturisers, have been nominated in the Ethical Small Business Award Category. Sold through EthicalSuperstore since 2008, Yes products may not be the first line that springs to mind when thinking of ethical trading, but these intimate products have become one of our increasingly popular lines. Sarah and Susi are pioneers for ethical trading in this field, making them excellent contenders for the award.

Zaytoun, also nominated in the Ethical Small Business category, is an olive oil producing company run by Heather Gardener-Masoud, dedicated to improving the lives of olive farmers in Palestine. Showing real dedication to her cause Heather started as a volunteer, before identifying the market gap and transforming her fledgling idea into a multi-million pound business. Her development of the world’s first Fairtrade olive oil and obvious commitment to the cause makes Heather a forerunner in this category.

Despite the current economic climate, people are still choosing to shop ethically to ensure that their hard earned cash benefits the people who deserve it most. Indeed perhaps you could even say that shopping ethically will help to foster the green shoots of hope of economic recovery in places that really need it.

Here at Ethical Superstore we are proud to support women who pioneer in ethical business. The three women nominated for the 2009 awards have vitally contributed to improving the lives of others through viable and profitable businesses, and we wish them all possible success in the final.

Click here to place your vote. The deadline is Friday June 19 at 5pm.

We work hard to provide the best possible online shopping service in the ethical products world.  To help us make our product range more complete and our services even better, we invite you to share your views by taking part in our Ethical Consumer Survey.

We’re running the survey until the 20th of May, following which we’ll share the results on the EthicalSuperstore.com website, as well as start working on the suggestions we receive!

Complete our survey and you’ll be entered into our competition to win a £100 gift voucher for shopping on Ethicalsuperstore.com!

Click here to take The Ethical Consumer Survey 2009 »

Our friends at Divine Chocolate have come up with a fantastically novel way to encourage people to send an email to politicians to keep fair trade on the agenda at next week’s G20. It’s a simple game – Egg a Politician. You get to throw a chocolate egg at one of  five world leaders — Barack Obama, Nicolas Sarkozy, Gordon Brown, Manmohan Singh or Wen Jiabao — who are all attending the G20 summit, where finance ministers and central bank governors of 19 countries and the European Union will meet to discuss “key issues related to global economic stability”.

As well as the therapy of hurling the egg at your leader of choice, you then get the opportunity to send an email to that leader – direct from the page – just as soon as they’ve devoured the chocolate.

When I first read about this idea I had visions similar to the incident that saw the

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I like clothes and I like shopping for them but over Christmas I looked at my wardrobe and decided enough was enough; no more fast fashion, and I’ve been looking for guilt free shopping alternatives ever since.

I’ve adopted the following Fashion rules

• Do I really need a new…..?
• Will I wear it more then once?
• Is it really worth the cash?
• Is it well made?
• And no more fast fashion-stores; Primark being at top of my list.

In January my first initiative was actually selling old clothes which I no longer wear on ebay and using the money to either buy vintage items that I couldn’t usually afford, expanding the organic fibres in my wardrobe or saving the money for a rainy day. This has been working brilliantly as I’ve sold in total 22 items and made some shrewd purchases including a pair of Vintage Terry de Havilland wedges. I’ve only had to make a couple of trips to the post office and in the process cleared space in my wardrobe and am now the proud owner of a great pair of shoes with some cash put aside for that rainy day.

In February I attended a

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Whilst enjoying my tea and toast this morning, I was pleased to hear the news announcer declaring that America anticipates pulling itself out of the recession by the end of the year. This headline was music to my ears, as surely global recovery will eventually follow. I’m sure everyone is as sick of hearing about ‘the current economic climate’ as I am, so an end to this Credit Crunch will be a huge relief.

With so much doom and gloom in the media, one would be forgiven for thinking that everything in our economy has ground entirely to a halt. However here at Ethical Superstore we’re absolutely delighted that even in this current economic climate (sorry – I couldn’t resist using the phrase!), people are still staying true to their beliefs and their ethics and continuing to buy what they believe.

Beliefs and principles are important to all of us, but the good news for consumers is that often products that are easy on the environment don’t need to cost you a fortune - We’ve got plenty of energy saving gadgets which will help you to reduce your fuel bills, and many of our household and cleaning selection are great money savers too. But beyond these items, we are so pleased that so many of you are staying faithful to your loyalty to fair trade and organic products amongst other beliefs, despite their (often unfounded) reputations for being slightly more expensive.

Read the rest of Credit Crunch Defying Ethics »

At Ethical Superstore we are passionate about supporting good causes, trying to tackle injustices, and doing our bit to make the world a better place. That’s why, where ever possible, we endeavour to stock products that can back up their claims; whether through accreditation like the Fairtrade Label or an endorsement by the Soil Association.

Ethical Superstore have been donating £1 for every order placed by our customer community this week to Comic Relief (we’ve raised over £700 so far!), and our staff have felt compelled to get involved.

That’s why when Red Nose Day was on the horizon we set about making our own contribution to the day that it often remembered for slapstick comedy, over-sized noses and fancy dress. We’re not one’s to break with convention on this one, so we all donned our finest 80’s gear and Red Noses, tucked into some home made party food, and took part in a couple of quizzes all in the name of a good cause.

There was no place for any Mitchell & Webb style Flashdance routines (despite Vic’s outfit!) but we did all share Comic Relief’s vision which is ‘a just world free from poverty’.

However, what’s the story behind the headlines? Where does your money go? And what happens when the cameras stop rolling?

Read the rest of Behind The Scenes Of Comic Relief »

So we are now in week 3 of Lent and still the Ethical Superstore diet is going pretty well (in summary, for six weeks I’m only going to eat what we sell in the Ethical Superstore range).

At first my biggest problem was giving up milk in tea and coffee. I really didn’t like the taste without milk and the various substitutes work well for most things apart from in tea and coffee. However, I think I’ve become acclimatised to no milk in my hot drinks now – in fact I accidentally put it in my tea on Tuesday morning and couldn’t understand why my tea tasted so horrible. Maybe black tea and coffee will be a change for life….

Bread making continues to be the high point using the Doves Farm bread kit. Experimented with adding a little sugar and vegetable fat (around a teaspoon of each) and ended up with a bigger loaf and a more even “rise”.  There is a chocolate cake in the range too – so I think I’ll make that my treat this weekend.

I guess that the biggest challenge of eating only from the Ethical Superstore range for anyone with a  busy life, is the lack of ready meals. The Just Wholefoods range comes close and has allowed me to make meals with cous cous and biriyani without too much effort. The veggie bangers are lovely too. Also at £1.35 for  a pack that serves two people – they are good value too.

However, the only reason why the challenge can work at all is the fantastic

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Having messed around with my family’s food and drink options during Fairtrade Fortnight, I’ve decided to sneakily introduce Meat Free Mondays at a time when their defences are low.

Before I move on to that, my fair trade education went down a storm. As expected, there was outrage when one member of the family got a bar of chocolate and the rest got none. Not sure how much the message got through their own seething sense of injustice at that stage. Then the emotional pressure exerted on the most fortunate one worked and we experienced a family bonding moment as he broke the chocolate into pieces into the fondue pot and let us all dip fair trade fruit into it. Touching. Memorable. An insight into fair trade? Time will tell…

Back to Meat Free Mondays. This idea has been brewing for a while, having read about it in a magazine. My husband is back to being a full-time vegetarian; my ten year old daughter is toying with the idea; and we are definitely eating more vegetables since joining the organic veg box scheme. Even my oldest son is being pressured by his girlfriend to eat

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