Fair Trade Producers from around the world
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The Enterprising Kitchen is a non-profit business created to provide employment and life skills training to women who are working towards self-sufficiency and independence.
In the era of welfare reform, The Enterprising Kitchen, a non-profit micro-enterprise, strives to address the needs of those women whose difficult personal histories, often including substance abuse and homelessness, would otherwise make them among the least likely to find work and achieve independence. The unique combination of a small business and experiential job training and life skills development supports the efforts of chronically unemployed women toward self-sufficiency and permanent employment.
Within the context of a small business that produces high quality hand-made soaps, women receive hands-on, intensive assistance that includes: paid employment, work and life skills training and a variety of other support services. The Enterprising Kitchen's operation of a micro-enterprise enables women to maximize their individual potential. Furthermore, the financial resources generated by product sales help to sustain and develop the program.
Women's Bean Project works with poor, homeless women in Denver, Colorado to teach women needed job and life skills so they can become self-supporting. It markets soup mixes, pasta and vinegars. The employees, about 15 women at a time, also attend in-house workshops to learn life skills, addressing issues such as budgeting, conflict management, assertiveness training, interviewing for jobs and developing their own support systems. By involving individuals in the community with the women of the Project, the Bean Project raises awareness among professionals, students, and others that homelessness and the needs of women living in poverty must be addressed practically and holistically.
Gift Baskets containing Women's Bean Project Beans:
A group of women on public assistance in Raleigh-Durham NC work as part of a cooperative called Candles of Hope. The women handroll high quality beeswax candles to generate income for their families as they earn a fair share of the purchase price of each candle that they roll. The members of the Craftmakers of Hope Cooperative started producing beeswax candles in 1994 with a $1000 grant from One World Market in Durham, North Carolina.
The members of the cooperative are all women, and most are single mothers receiving public assistance. Coop members gather at a local church to dye the sheets of beeswax and handroll the candles. Gloria Green, a member of the coop, says, "Our hopes are to be financially independent and spiritually focused and to help our communities... We hope to make a change for the future, for the better."
Today's Trading is a small group of Chinese immigrant women in San Francisco. Rather than toil in the many garment sweatshops here in the Bay Area, these women decided to form their own sewing shop and market independently. They create beautiful velvet and cotton hats, scarves, and hairties with a San Francisco flair.
In 1992, the Crenshaw High School student owners of Food from the 'Hood started a campus garden and began selling producer at local Farmers' Markets in Los Angles, California. They introduced a Creamy Italian salad dressing as a accompaniment to their salad greens. Company "profits" provide college scholarships for the student-owners, and 25% of each crop is donated to feed the hungry in the school's community.
San Francisco League of Urban Gardeners
The San Francisco League of Urban Gardeners is a grass roots organization founded in 1983 after a decrease in Federal funding for community based greening and gardening projects. SLUG's founders felt a pressing need to support those interested in urban greening, neighborhood beautification and local food production in San Francisco, the nation's third most densely populated city. Since it's inception in 1983, SLUG has grown to an organization with 65 full-time staff that coordinate programs which empower communities and individuals with education and employment.
In response to a need for viable career options for young adults, San Francisco League of Urban Gardeners created Urban Herbals, a line of value-added organic gourmet products which produces herbal vinegar, fruit jams, salsa and honey. SLUG's most noted enterprise operation, Urban Herbals empowers young at-risk adults with employment while involving them in the process of community based entrepreneurship. This job training and revenue generating project provides the skills for young adults to obtain meaningful long-term employment in the future and to ultimately create their own businesses.
Urban Herbals employees are given the responsibility of running an actual business. They are trained in all areas of business operation, including production, distribution, marketing, and finance. The employees receive primarily on-the-job training, although they also attend formal training classes to learn computer programs, marketing skills, production methods, and communication skills. Within the setting of a viable business, Urban Herbals teaches its employees valuable career and entrepreneurial skills while instilling in them a sense of pride and accomplishment.