Over the years we have worked with cuppers from around the world as a tool to find and secure delicious coffee. We wondered, how can we better connect baristas and coffee shop owners, the folks who sell and represent the delicious coffee we work so hard to lay hands on, with coffee cuppers, the people that work so hard to get us these tasty little beans? The result: Cooperation in Quality 2013.
This July, exactly 10 years after taking a group of food co-op and natural foods store customers to visit with coffee farmers in the village of Coyona in Peru, our same group will return to to see first-hand the impact of Fair Trade.
Equal Exchange is honored to be featured on the cover of the latest issue of Yes! Magazine. The entire issue features stories about how co-operatives present a proven alternative to the conventional economy.
March is Equal Exchange Bananas Month! We are proud to be able to share our successes and challenges with you during March. Here are a few accomplishments.
You may have heard about food co-op general managers, employees, church members, or Equal Exchange staff making the trek down to the places where coffee, tea and cocoa are grown. In October of 2011, Equal Exchange took our first delegation to see a very different product: bananas!
Beth Ann Caspersen, Quality Control Manager, and Lynsey Miller, Director of Sales & Marketing for Advanced Coffee, recently visited coffee producers in Uganda. Lynsey reflects on some takeaways here:
Check this out.
The farmers of Gumutindo co-op in Uganda would not have these things if they just were going at it as a single individual farmer:
The Tangibles
Starting with: Equal Exchange was born in a tiny office on Albany Street in Boston, Mass., in 1986. We now have offices in West Bridgewater, Mass., St. Paul, Minn., and Portland, Ore.; a cafe in Boston, and an espresso bar in Seattle, Wa.
The Cooperative Fund of New England (CFNE) is a community development financial institution (CDFI) that is a bridge between socially responsible investors and co-operatives, community oriented non-profits, and worker-owned businesses in New England. Equal Exchange Food Service Sales Representative, LJ Taylor, is the former board president of CFNE.
The great thing about working at a place like Equal Exchange is that not only can innovation come from anywhere in the company, but that it is actually nurtured and encouraged from anyone and everyone. Take some of the recent innovations that our Customer Service teams recently initiated.
