(Sundance, Utah) May 27, 2005—Sundance has decided to offer only Fair Trade Certified coffee at its resort and restaurants it was announced today. By partnering with Park City Roasters, a Fair Trade Certified company, owned and operated by Ray and Rob Hibl, Sundance will do its part to insure a livable wage for coffee laborers. Sundance is one of the few resorts in the country that is currently selling Fair Trade Coffee.

"In Park City Roasters, and with a little nudge from my friend Father Jim Flynn of St. Mary's Roman Catholic Church in Park City, Sundance has found another way to work with like-minded companies to foster social and environmental sustainability," commented Raymond T. Grant, Sundance Executive Director.

The Fair Trade Certified label guarantees that farmers and workers received a fair price for their product. The Fair Trade price means that farmers can feed their families and that their children can go to school instead of working in the fields.

Sundance resort and related venues that will offer Fair Trade Coffee include the 100 rooms of Sundance lodging, Sundance catering and the Sundance restaurants, the Tree Room, the Foundry Grill, Zoom in Park City and other outlets that include the Sundance Deli, and skiers cafes, Bear Claw and Creekside. Fair Trade coffee is organic, mountain and shade grown. Park City Roasters provides Fair Trade coffees from Nicaragua, Mexico, Peru and Ethiopia. They also roast and ship the coffee for distribution. The "Sundance Blend" coffee is a naturally great tasting coffee made from a custom blend of Peru organic, Nicaraguan organic and Ethiopian organic coffee beans.

The journey of bringing coffee from, for example, the Nicaraguan mountainside to a coffee cup is a laborious one that moves from tree to basket to processing to market to cup. Laborers in Nicaragua are responsible for choosing and picking the bright red beans and facilitating the remainder of the journey. Through Fair Trade, workers who would receive as little as .48 cents per pound for the coffee beans they pick, receive at least $1.20 per pound of our $10 for one pound of coffee.

In November of 2004, Reverend Jim Flynn of St. Mary's Roman Catholic Church in Park City, led a group of delegates, "Witness for Peace," to Nicaragua to learn more about the working and living conditions of coffee laborers. While in Nicaragua, the group lived as the laborers did and subsisted on the same amount the workers did, $4.50 a day for three people. Upon returning to Utah, the group became active in educating the public about the economic conditions of coffee laborers in Latin America and facilitating partnerships, such as the one between Sundance and Park City Roasters.

Fair Trade is an innovative, market-based approach to sustainable development. Fair Trade helps family farmers in developing countries to gain direct access to international markets, as well as to develop the business capacity necessary to compete in the global marketplace. By learning how to market their own harvests, Fair Trade farmers are able to bootstrap their own businesses and receive a fair price for their products. This leads to higher family living standards, thriving communities and more sustainable farming practices. Fair Trade empowers farming families to take care of themselves - without developing dependency on foreign aid.

"Sundance's willingness to serve Fair Trade Certified Coffee is an important step for the long haul struggle for justice for some of the poorest people in the world, Nicaraguan coffee producers," commented Father Flynn.

Fair Trade products are identified by the "Fair Trade Certified" label. The United States is the largest consumer of the world's coffee, consuming one fifth of the coffee produced. Fair Trade encompasses the principles of producers receiving a living wage, healthy and safe working conditions, equal employment opportunities, forced labor and exploitive child labor are not allowed, producers have access to financial and technical assistance and all aspects of trade and production are open to public accountability.