Hi, my name is Andy Ashcroft and, together with my business partner Mike Trodd, we form the Koolskools partnership. This is our very fist blog. We hope you will join us regularly to hear how the Koolskools ethical clothing project is evolving – and also to have some FUN! with our quirky Fairtrade quizzes and “off (and on!) the wall” articles, videos and reports!
We want to offer you a regular insight into:
- Koolskools, our ethical business approach and our Fairtrade cotton clothing project
- our business and educational relationship with schools and how easy it is for your school to participate.
- some of the projects and themes we are working on to develop the Koolskools business and educational standard;
- our outreach to charities and corporates and the wider market.
Our passion for Fairtrade
When we started this project, Mike and I felt there was a need to plug a gap in the school clothing market with good quality, fairly priced Fairtrade cotton garments.
Our Journey
So how did we start? Well, we started talking to niche manufacturers in various parts of the world who share our fair trading ethos and who were prepared to join us in our journey to become a Fairtrade cotton certified supplier – companies in Latin America, Africa and Asia. It has taken us nearly two years to reach the stage of bringing high quality Fairtrade cotton clothing to market, as we are doing in 2011.
Now that we have exactly the right sort of products to offer we are finding that an increasing number of schools across the UK want to work with us – not only to have our Fairtrade cotton garments as part of their school uniforms, but also to enjoy the benefits of the Koolskools educational partnership on Fairtrade and fair trading. What’s the difference? Too much information for our first blog!! But we promise to cover this topic and many more in the coming weeks and months.
Finally for this week, we want our readers to know that Koolskools became Fairtrade licensed in September 2010, an indication of support from the Fairtrade Foundation and a significant boost to our project. All of the content in this website has been and will continue to be put together in co-operation with the Fairtrade Foundation. That includes the Fairtrade quizzes that you are very welcome to have a go at – just decide which category of quiz you would like to have a crack at first!
See you soon!