Trade As One

Our good friends at The Freedom Summit have compiled some great resources on the issue of Human Trafficking. They’ve uploaded their conference handbook, which is a really thorough description of the issue and the fight against it. They’ve also uploaded the full video of each of their plenary sessions, featuring some really talented speakers. The videos can be downloaded here, and feature Bethany Huang from the IJM institute, Francis Chan from Cornerstone Simi, David Batstone from Not for Sale, and our very own Nathan George. Click here to learn more .

Ollie is the 2 year old golden lab that belongs to the George Family. He spends his days running around on the beach in Santa Cruz, playing with the George’s 3 boys, and eating whatever the Georges try to hide from him (recent examples: a bottle of Grandma George’s blood pressure pills, whole tubs of butter, half a pizza, a whole bunch of bananas). Rough life, huh? Ollie’s got it made.

So you might think that Ollie just takes and takes, but he has a very unique, very important role to play within Trade as One: protector of sanity. Things get pretty crazy around here as we try to build a company, keep our finances extremely streamlined so that our producers in the developing world reap the benefits of your purchases, prepare for the craziness of the Christmas season, and (oh, yeah) hang out with our families as well.

Ollie provides the sanity. His presence in the George house for team meetings, at some of our events, and often in the warehouse (don’t tell our landlord) for some of our regular workdays always brings just the right amount of joy and silliness. He is impossible to stress out (he IS from Santa Cruz after all), impossible to offend, and always in a good mood. He’s our favorite dog.

Lucinda Kemp-Erisman stumbled across our website and offered to contribute her considerable writing talents to what we do. She both passionate and experienced in the world of fair trade, having launched her own fair trade fabrics business a while back. She offers a unique perspective on the unique role the Mother plays in fair trade, and on the connections between mothers here in America and mothers in the developing world making the products we use. If you’re interested in guest posting on our blog, email us at (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

The woman wakes early, worrying about the day ahead, worrying about her family, her children. The extra sleep would have been a welcome respite from from the busy pace of her day - fixing the morning meal, caring for the children, working all day, then more cooking and cleaning, the seemingly endless cycle of chores. 
 
This woman could be anywhere in the world. Me, here in America, or a mother from Togo, West Africa or a mother from a small village in Guatemala or Cambodia. Because as mothers, we are all connected by a common bond - a bond of placing our children first. A bond of sacrifice for our children, as we make sure they are fed and clothed and have the best we can offer. Because women around the world spend twice as much time as men on unpaid activities. That’s something we mothers all have in common – not enough time!

Seventy percent of the world’s 1.3 billion people living…

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The Handmade Expressions story has more than a few parallels to the Trade as One story. Both Manish Gupta (Handmade Expressions) and Nathan George (Trade as One) had successful careers in the tech industry that provided them with all of the comforts you could ask for. Both had their hearts broken by poverty in the developing world. Both saw that business done fairly could be an answer, and changed their careers and lifestyles in order to use their talents to fight poverty through trade.

Handmade Expressions are passionate about treating both people and planet with dignity and respect. Perhaps the most intriguing aspect of what they do is the creative way that their artisans use recycled materials to make beautiful and useful products. They use everything from tree resin (to avoid cutting down trees), to recycled cotton paper and cruelty-free leather (harvested from animals who die naturally), to recycled cassette tapes. Yes, you read that correctly, cassette tapes. You were wondering where all your cassette tapes went? We found them. They’re in the Very Special Folding Bag.

I thought I’d post a small excerpt from a story they just passed along. It details how they connected with their latest producer group.

It all began after receiving an email from a young girl named Sana living in Jama Masjid, Old Delhi, India. She explained that her family and members of the community make jewelry, but are being mistreated by their few current employers. Seeing that Handmade Expressions sold jewelry similar to the jewelry her community makes, Sana found hope for future employment.

“When we seen your website we feeling there is someone in the world who can take care people like us,” Sana wrote.

We’re proud to work with Handmade Expressions to bring much needed fair and stable employment into India, and to showcase their creative work to bring about a more sustainable world.

Trade as One has been blessed with so many people who have given so much of their time and talent to support what we do. They’ve worked tirelessly to help us accomplish our goals, and we can honestly say that our success has hinged on their efforts. We call these people our stalwarts, and we’re going to profile them here on our blog so that you can see what they’ve done and why they do it. First on the list: Shelton Green. We’ve posted excerpts from an interview we did with him below. Make sure to read through to the bottom to see the radical decisions he’s made regarding his own consumer behavior. If you’d like to volunteer with us, please send us an email at (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

What sparked your interest in fair trade?

I first became seriously interested in fair trade when my faith community, Journey, hosted a Trade as One market in 2007. I had heard of fair trade before that and knew it was a good thing, but really only associated it with coffee and little knick-knacks and trinkets.

How did you get connected with Trade as One?

After the market at Journey I emailed ‘info@tradeasone.com’ saying that I wanted to help in any way that I could, and specifically to connect Trade as One with more churches in Texas.  I fully expected to get a very polite email back in a week saying ‘thank you, we will be in touch’ and for that to be the end of it.  However…

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