Categories
Sustainable and Ethical Practice
It’s always been our desire to give back every time we buy coffee and every time we sell coffee.
For every sack of coffee we buy we get to directly contribute to the lives of the growers and their families and the same goes for every bag of coffee we sell.
We are currently establishing more ways to help provide financial support in deprived coffee growing regions of the world - helping set up initiatives in education, village water source programmes and coffee planting and processing.
To do this we are partnering with ethical charities such as ActionAid. As more information becomes available on this initiative we will blog it.
This way with every cup our Customers can taste the difference and make a difference.
We have also looked at each part of the business that affects our local environment and have drawn up a list of priorities and, more importantly, what we will do about them.
Packaging - Nearly all of our packaging and printed material is either recycled or comes from sustainable resources. Our only compromise are our foil coffee pouches, however we are busy working to source biodegradable pouches and when we find some that hold the coffee in an environment that does not compromise the quality we will change.
Energy - Coffee Real’s electricity comes from 100% 'green' sources; a mixture of wind, solar, wave and hydro-electricity. It may cost us little more - but we know it makes sense.
Our main roastery lighting is super energy efficient and all other lights are switched off when areas are not in use - this may seem ‘old hat’ to some - but its impact can easily be forgotten in the pursuit of bigger energy-saving solutions.
Carbon - although we are a very small company we still produce a carbon footprint. We are seeking advice from the Carbon Trust in order to identify and work on a raft of energy-saving measures to become neutral by June 2011. Going forward we will establish baseline information on our energy usage at all Company touch points with a view to reducing our use - this will also mean looking at supplier environmental policies.
Water - water consumption adds up – so we have installed water hippos in our staff toilets. These devices reduce the amount of water used when the toilet is flushed. We also have a range of rain harvesting devices that water our collection of coffee plants in our green house.
Recycling - we have recycling facilities to recycle everything we can - from paper to composting of coffee grounds.
