The Fairer World shop is open 11.00am to 5.00pm, 6 days a week, Monday to Saturday. Customers are not admitted inside the Fairer World shop, however, but are being served by staff from the front entrance. We will be reviewing this situation in mid-Autumn.
Payment is usually by card (or by bank transfer, or by cheque), please, although some customers have occasionally paid with cash.
We are increasing the number and range of crafts available for personal shoppers and for stalls. As well as new Mexican and Guatemalan crafts sent to us by our friend John at Just Trade, we have been recycling a lot of cardboard recently, with the positive side-effect of uncovering some old crafts and cleaning materials in our storage unit. We are having a cleaning sale as a result, because these cleaning products are at least 3 years old, and may not necessarily work as effectively as brand new ones. So they will be offered at reduced prices. Details are to be found on our latest Short-dated Foods and Cleaning Products Price List, dated 3.8.23. We have only a small stock of many of the short-dated food products on this list but there is more depth of stock for most of the reduced price cleaning products.
We have recently had a mailing from Transform Trade (formerly Traidcraft Exchange), transform-trade.org, with some exciting future plans to restore something of the positive force which was Traidcraft and a request for financial support to help bring these plans to fruition. Transform Trade has taken ownership of the Traidcraft brand (last April) but is being understandably cautious as far as the future is concerned because these plans need money to bring them to fruition. Our own financial resources are still very limited, as people are aware, but we would suggest fair trade supporters have a look at Transform Trade’s request for financial support / get in touch with Transform Trade to find out more about their plans. We will try to keep our readers up-to-date with developments.
As far as Fairer World is concerned, we have a decision to make as to whether we sign a new lease for the premises at 84 Gillygate with our landlord, City of York Council. The cost of the rent is difficult for us to sustain (£13,300 pa under the next lease), whilst our sales income remains so low. We have a number of trading debts to pay and loans from supporters to repay. We (Moira and Charlie) are in the process of trying to claim pensions due to us and to obtain probate of Moira’s mother’s estate to help in providing the cash for the debt and loan repayments and to widen the range of stock available. All of this is a slow process. We do want to continue trading, however, as we believe that this is the approach to take as it is one which offers the most benefit to fair trade producers.
In addition, we have a bill to pay for internal work at 84 Gillygate caused by damp during the lockdown. Now that repairs have been completed, Moira Bridge has returned to spend more time in the shop – previously we thought the mould spores would be inappropriate for someone with an asthmatic condition. We have been surprised and disappointed to be asked to pay for all the internal work and half of the external work, because of the provisions in our lease, however. We would welcome any comments on this situation and any suggestions for alternative sites for the Fairer World shop.
Stock update
All the following products are back in stock at Fairer World:
- Clipper Organic Papua New Guinea instant coffee
- Clipper Organic Freeze Dried Decaffeinated instant coffee
- Suma Organic Ethiopia Yirgacheffe ground coffee
- Equal Exchange Organic Mexican Clear and Set Honey
- Wainwright’s Organic Zambian Clear and Set Honey
- Just Trading Scotland Brown and White Kilombero rice from Malawi is now in stock in 3 Kg sizes and also in the new 500g sizes. The 500g size packets are branded True Origin, which is Just Trading Scotland’s new name
- Liberation Salted Peanuts & Cashews
- Tropical Wholefoods Just 5 Organic Date & Walnut bars
- Liberation Peanut Butter with salt
- Suma Organic Peanut Butter crunchy with salt