Small Business

Our last Eco Icon on www.yourtomorrow.co.uk is the Small Business Icon is not about encouraging managers to be more ethical. It is to encourae individuals to express themselves through their ideas, designs and products. It is to help provide consumers with greater variety than can be found in the high street, which is dominated by similar stores selling the same products. Variety provides choice to us all and it should complement high volumes and low prices. We do not all want to wear the same clothes or jewellery, or to give the same products as gifts! You can see some of our products in this category at http://www.yourtomorrow.co.uk/product/14/cleversticks-construction-sets.php and http://www.yourtomorrow.co.uk/product/18/deluxe-rose-gift-set.php and http://www.yourtomorrow.co.uk/product/14/wooden-jigsaw-maps.php.
These products are all made by small local producers who just want to make a living by running ethical businesses and they produce low quantities of specialised products. They could not supply the large retail chains whose quantity demands would just be too big for them to cope with!

Recycled Products

I suppose it is a statement of the obvious that it has to be better to use old and used products for a new purpose, rather than throwing them away and adding to the mountain of waste material in our landfills; we might even make a fashion out of reusing products. Sometimes this can be simply taking advantage of different technical stages in countries across the world, such as finding homes for unwanted computers in lesser developed countries. This is a very worthy process and one to be applauded and encouraged.
At Yourtomorrow we have some products that use Printed Circuit Boards (PCBs) and turn these into desk items (see http://www.yourtomorrow.co.uk/product/13/recycled-pcb-mouse-mat.php for the Mouse Mat and http://www.yourtomorrow.co.uk/product/13/recycled-pcb-wall-clock.php for the wall clock). These are both made from new PCBs, made in larger quanities than required by the computer manufacturers, and then made into other products rather than being thrown away. Altenatively our recycled glasses are made out of old bottles. funky but attractive. http://www.yourtomorrow.co.uk/product/7/recycled-grolsch-goblets.php are beautiful glasses made from old Grolsch beer bottles while http://www.yourtomorrow.co.uk/product/7/recycled-glass-tumbler-clear.php are simple clear glass tumblers made from wine bottles. These are all examples of reusing products and turning them into something else useful rather than throwing them away. They are examples of Recycling as a creative activity. What better way to spread the word that you believe in building a better world for future generations than to give such a gift?

Natural Products

The sixth (if I have counted correctly!) Eco Icon on www.yourtomorrow.co.uk encourages Natural Products. I am not an expert in the medical particulars of "natural" products; my business partner and nephew Nick knows far more about harmful ingredients than I do. He knows about things like SLS and SLES and the health dangers to your body of using products containing suchlike ingredients.
My concern is less medical, more economic. I know that people are very tempted to put short term profit before long term health and well-being. I know that business motivations can drive people to produce things that make money in the short term, even though they have long term damaging effects on our health, the environment and social equity. How do we stop this?
This is the $64,000 question. Not everyone can have a second chance at life and a BGO (Blinding Glimpse of the Obvious) like me. But it seems to me that, as a society, we can simply change things just by using our spending power. If a business will sell more if it is run "ethically" and produces "natural" products, then we need do no more! Business peope and managers will just follow the market. As consumers we only need to build "ethics" and "natural" into our purchasing decisions. This is the reason we have tried to summarise all the factors that will, hopefully, lead to a better future with our Eco-Icons.
Use these, or similar, principles to help you make your own purchasing choices. Buy cosmetics and "smellies" that are natural and do not contain unnecessary, and potentially harmful, ingredients. There are plenty of natural products available and they are just as good to use, albeit they may not have the same shelf life and may even cost a bit more. We feature natural products from Holistic Tree on Yourtomorrow. These products are available on the site, such as http://www.yourtomorrow.co.uk/product/18/bath-gift-basket.php and they are made by a small company in Halifax. The products are carefully hand-made by Julie and her team, she is a qualified pharmacist who really does care about her products being "natural" and not harmful; they smell good too!
Be careful what you eat too! After my heart surgery I have learned a lot about what food is good for me but, far more importantly, what is not! I am not involved in selling food, but if I were I would have a lot to say about the ingredients that we put into food in order to make it look nicer, last longer, cost less. The result is that we are too fat and unhealthy. This is yet another example of short term profits driving us towards long term adverse consequences.

My idea is to create a community of like-minded people who care about making the world a better place

Blogs have arrived and are the perfect solution; they enable people to discuss “ethical” issues in a non-judgemental format. They encourage people to express their ideas and views without worrying what other people think. How better to form a community?

Read my blog and leave comments, serious, thought through and supported by evidence or just light hearted, spontaneous and only your personal opinions.

Start your own blog . . . You can even add pictures or an article that has inspired you.

Together we can find ways to develop a better world. This is something that most people want but feel that their individual effort will make little difference. Together we CAN make a difference!

At Last ....

I want to take a break from describing the Eco Icons, because I can now report that www.yourtomorrow.co.uk is finally able to do something tangible for the future good of the world. We have received supplies of the Thump Mat drinks coaster and, by selling them, are helping a local community, Wotnot in South Africa. Wotnot provides employment for AIDS patients to enable them to be financially independent and it is, in their own words, "the support of our customers who make this happen".
The Thump Mat coasters are made using a nautical knot (the Thump Mat knot!) and they can be brought from the following address, http://www.yourtomorrow.co.uk/product/30/176.php. In order to incentivize sales at the start, we are offering a free keyring worth £5, also made from a sailor's knot, the Monkey's Fist. We are the first seller of this product into the UK and I am very excited that we are finally doing something unique to meet our objectives, that is helping the future of our world!
I met Hilary Abraham who set up this project and, of course, is a keen sailor, quite by chance. She told me about the Wotnot project, her involvement in it and I was hooked. I immediately placed my first order and I hope that it will be the first of many in the future! The Thump Mats represent everything that "ethical gifts" should. They are attractive to our UK taste, useful, reasonably priced and really help people that are less lucky than ourselves. Finally, I feel that I may be doing something useful!

Local Products

"Food Miles" is a big topic at the moment and, at last, we are beginning to build "distance travelled" into our purchasing decisions. Did you see the tv programme where two families were sent to buy similar meal menus? One bought the ingredients from their local supermarket; this was cheaper but the food had travelled thousands of miles. The other family expended time and trouble finding ingredients locally and saved many food miles! It does not take much effort to seek out food items that are local, especially when the foods are in season. It becomes much more difficult to take distance travelled into consideration when it comes to other products, however because locally produced items are so often more expensive. That is why we try, where possible, to ensure that goods locally produced are shipped straight to you, the customer's door. Examples are our Cardboard Pod Toys on http://www.yourtomorrow.co.uk/product/14/137.php or the Jigsaw Maps on http://www.yourtomorrow.co.uk/product/14/83.php. These are made in the UK and shipped straight to your door, so saving energy and cost in shipping all around the world. That is why "Local" is another Eco Icon on http://www.yourtomorrow.co.uk.

Fair Trade and Helping Developing Countries

These are two of our Eco Icons and two more ways in which you can help contribute to a better world for the future by buying gifts from lesser developed countries from www.yourtomorrow.co.uk. The benefits for buying products that are made by people employed in fair, safe and human conditions are obvious; what a demonstration of people's greed that they take advantage of other's weaknesses to make money for themselves. Fair Trade is a simple way to ensure that market pressures do not result in human suffering, no employment of children, reduced price fluctuation because of climatic or market conditions, fair pay and employment policies. These are well documented and for more details about these, see the websites http://www.fairtrade.org.uk/ and http://www.ifat.org/.
However, why do we have two sections on our website www.yourtomorrow.co.uk , both Fair Trade and Helping Developing Countries? We aim to help the future of the world and a lot of good ethical local activities are not able to get Fair Trade accreditation, because they are too small or do not want to get involved in administration and bureaucracy. These are developed countries' ideas and can detract from the job in hand. We, therefore, have to recognise that Fair Trade does some good, but that also there are communities that cannot, or do not want to be, accredited by Fair Trade organisations. Two examples, at different ends of the spectrum, are featured on the website. Firstly we sell items from a well established business which imports product from Cambodia. I have no doubts about their "ethical" credentials, but they avoid Fair Trade organisations because they believe these organisations are bureaucratic and unnecessary; see some of their handbags on http://www.yourtomorrow.co.uk/product/12/11.php. At the other extreme the Whatknot Wellness Centre is a brand new community trying to help AIDs patients in South Africa and being approved by a Fair Trade organisation is far from the top of their priority list; see their Thump Mats on http://www.yourtomorrow.co.uk/product/30/176.php
Those of you with suspicious natures will be thinking, "but supposing that behind these organisations is someone just out to make money from me". That is the fear that provides the raison d'etre behind the Fair Trade organisations and provides much employment and intellectual activity. Far be it from me to discount this view, but it is just not my priority. My answer to this is just to point you towards John Seddon and his views on getting the job done, rather than just focussing on the administration and paperwork; http://www.lean-service.com/home.asp. I read his book "Freedom From Command and Control, A Better Way To Make The Work Work" and this inspired me that it far better to concentrate on just trying to get things done, rather than ensuring things were administratively perfect.

Educational

The second thing that, in my opinion, will help build a better world for future generations is if we all were to spend more time educating ourselves and this is our second Eco Icon on the website www.yourtomorrow.co.uk . We have focused on presents that encourage people to educate themselves and others, developing the brain. Let's spend less time in front of the television watching mindless entertainment or playing addictive video games and expend much more effort on learning about things. Ask yourself, if you were to be a contestant on Mastermind, what would be your specialist subject? Do you have one, we all should because knowing about a subject is very satisfying and it is fun to find out more? My subject is Australian History, although I would not be prepared to subject myself to the rigours of Mastermind questions; my memory is just not good enough! I do love reading about the events that led to the recent creation of this very successful nation., however. There are some very interesting books.
I worry that future generations will lose the opportunity for pleasure and satisfaction from learning because all they will understand is how to download the latest game or tune onto their Ipods. That is why we sell toys and games that stimulate the mind on http://www.yourtomorrow.co.uk/category/14.php.
This might provide you with an opportunity to get a friend or relative interested in doing something intellectual, a jigsaw, a Cleversticks construction set or an earth powered clock from Middlesex University. This is not to be dogmatic or to expect people to be slaves to the textbook, just to recognise that it is important to use the brain as well as the body. Education is about us older people showing younger generations that there is satisfaction to be gained from intellectual activites. Once that is recognised, then one actually enjoys being a slave to the textbook and education becomes a self-fulfilling philosophy. A trained mind has a mature perspective on the world and will help build a better world for future generations.