sc and it is a pleasure
well welcome to the show matter really he is the co-founder
and have fun
relations for just coffee dot coop
or original sponsor i mean not just on the majority report but also
back in the day and break room
uh... and uh...
a sponsor of this program but uh...
um... ag i wanted to talk to you matt because i want to do
an opportunity for our audience to just hear about the
uh... about what fair trade is uh...
uh... you know ned also again too
compliment you guys on your ah...
on your coffee i'll i'll bet by been drinking it now for so i guess
three-four years and uh...
the one thank you for the sponsorship but also uh... just
i appreciate your business
well thanks a lot appreciate worawut
super happy too
still be in partnership with the uh... to go another pen near fort support your
show
and that is just down the path
so yes the pleasure for us to work with you all and to be here on
the majority report with you
you've got that full disclosure
tell me about to tell the kids who can't tell tell the audience what
what what is fair trade
that
that chorus
uh... it's it's actually a really relevant question for right now com
in a fair trade at the concept that's been around at least
forty or fifty years uh... in the u_s_
came up through uh... church-based groups if that were working with um...
artisans and pick local south and recognizing the value at work that they
did
um... and trying to create better market for them here in the u_s_ where they can
receiver
fair wage for the work that they're doing
over the years it's become much more complex
and today what we're looking at is the situation in in our opinion anyway
uh... where there are two very uh... distinction main currents and fair trade
right now
uh... just copy-cat we consider ourselves part of what we see that the
movement
um... to bill a better
uh... economic model uh...
model of social and economic justice and economic democracy
um in trying to include those the coffee farmers who we work with
um... in that project and also bumpy and consumers at the coffee degree rests so
we see it as
away to sort of tear down those barriers that separate us in the marketplace and
lettuce you know
away for a thought given to each other and
to appreciate each other to work with each other's partners from the beginning
of a change at the end
uh... but there's another
very powerful sort of uh... piece of fair trade each data sent
i would call that the more market-based a piece of fair trade
and it is uh...
serve revolves around
uh... certification agencies and building a brand and working with large
corporations like starbucks and green mountain
companies and others uh... too
uh... builder brand
and promote that brand
in our opinion at the uh... apparel up the movement he said that uh... coming
down standards
uh... coming down the education piece for consumers
um... the latest
uh... picking a coffee industry with fair trade as it is a movement to allow
plantations
into the cartridge system which so it's been a way to highlight and uh... create
a market for
small farmers and their cooperatives
com began economic democracy itself
a lot of uh... unethical concept that this agreement and discussion going on
with unfair trade these days
comments of uh...
in a struggle over defining
that milkman is and
about how to report that's why
so
that uh... you know
uh... limited cell stitched here
uh... but but your prices
completely consistent
with uh...
with what it would cost me to go and buy
you know when the bag of beans at
uh... you know at a starbucks or
many cases it's it's even less expensive how is it that you guys manage to
the the suppliers the farmers uh...
or karthi
a affair wage uh... and still sort of delivered to the to the consumer anne
price that's consistent with everybody else's prints
well i mean i think the short answer to that is that our model isn't um... isn't
uh...
obsolete profit motivated model a business where units from the company to
to just mention like starbucks or
uh...
or other more bites that traditional
copy roosting enterprises uh... you know they're their mission is to uh... turn a
profit
either for small you know the smaller private roosters or or for their
shareholders for the bigger ones
us uh... you no profit at uh... as a for-profit business and we are that's
what we are technically
we do have to make a bit of a profit just to continue uh... continue doing
what we do have to be able to grow
but profit is not our main objective
learning objective is is building sort of this this movement and and uh...
and uh... this model of economic and social justice and we feel like a big
part of that
is uh...
you know economic had sort of readers distribution of wealth so
we do try to pay as much as we can to grow recently
been sort of um...
on the leading edge of that for several years now um... but also people at just
coffee aren't breaking the bank uh...
nobody hears it's getting wealthy and when we started the business that was
sort of a i'd be fine
uh... unit so that we realized that we we wouldn't do that that we ought to
realize if we could make enough to chart a future families and
and uh... you know com
pet trip to keep going but that's what we needed to do and
uh... and we're willing to do that so
i think that for us you know harder
being a fair trade model is not electing uh... the farmers uh... affair wait
you're trying to pick a fair way to but it's also being able to get the and
consumer
caper fairly priced
uh... product outlets
what we do
why cos cob c_
it seems to me that what
state fair trade is is most often associated with coffee is that men in my
just perceiving it that way because
you know i've been in business with you guys or is it happens in india in the
news that the case of because i just don't see
the concept of fair trade in other products in the same way mean to you
know with
were uh...
uh... apple obviously is in the news
uh... these days uh... and you know now they've uh...
agreed at least too
to provide air to have uh... they're their suppliers audited for
first standards and practices in terms of uh... where they treat their workers
but um...
you know they certainly
there's certainly no you don't hear much about fairtrade electronics uh...
whitewater bach
we hear about it more in terms of coffee
well i mean
you know coffee copy with through the first other than that you know that
smaller artisan
uh... stuff that was going on before copy copy was the first from global
commodity
uh... was introduced into partridge system and that had a fair criticism
constructed around it
under our other commodities
there's ki
uh... there's beneath their sugar
uh... there's why now there's flowers
uh... there there are a lot of things they're fairtrade certified quote
unquote
um which i think you know in some product that's more validity ten others
uh... print intiki
and uh... in
fruit bananas in particular uh... plantations have been part of that
perfect record out for a while
uh... and up to ten you know heroic controversy or
uh... with coffee i think you know
copy
not only is it one of the
one of the sort most rare commodities in the world adults are really lends itself
to
i replaced and shipped to end stories and if such an intimate part of so many
peoples lives i think it's been a really beauty product
to build uh...
texas around and give it a cult that story and get people to really
envisioned
well copies coming from and who it is that's growing at a coffee
uh... and so it's yeah i i i think that's probably
you know one of the main reasons
uh... why copycats concert at the forefront of this
cause electron exco i mean there are a lot of you know there's a lot of product
out there uh... it's really difficult when you look at electron ex and a lot
of others
and that's really complex commodity chain and copies of first report mother
teaching you know summers editor process to chip its first it
that so
uh... with electronics you have u_s_ things coming from all over and there's
contractors and subcontractors and the kind of like apparel
uh... and that way which is another complex commodity chain
from though but one of the things i think that but fair trade is done you
know with cops misreading the headliner but with other products is back
work we're not only trying to build the brand like them or sort of corporate
fairtrade model i think would have astute we'll also educating people
to sort of think beyond that seven seconds based and choosing a product in
the grocery store and looking at everything they buy taking you know
where where does this come from how was it mate how are people affected by my
consumer decision
and i think we're seeing that in in what's going on with apple you know this
weekend and other things for people are saying wait a second you know how
what what is the meaning of the spurs i'd fono holding my hand and analysis
affected people negatively positively so
i think that's when the great successes of the fair treatment minister tried to
get people to ask those questions every single thing that purchase
um... and at that that's really powerful you know we can do that we can make a
huge difference i think it will willing to get out there for them
everything that we call it
and this is talk briefly about uh... desktop the in particular
it's it's a co-op amin aside from the fact that sad to say like you know i'd
that your site is uh...
just coffee dot copies
if anybody's really interested in just a receipt for the whole process works you
guys
have a whole transparency but uh... sort of
section
uh... the site where you can see how much
and you guys pay per pound for the coffee you have a map uh...
the supply chains for
uh... the coffee indyk that presumably did their duty and uh...
the chocolate is well because our also caught how does that work
dimag it work
it it's it's kind of like a sometimes bitter works out really well guided
democracy the messy process is now and other
you know what are we were worker cooperatives so uh... that the people
that work at the business charles for the people that own business and the
majority of from
people working at just copy ross orders
so uh... you know it's it's been there it's been an incredible sorta process
prestige even figure out
over the years what a co-op is and how
iniki ran effectively uh... you know pat to have a successful business
and also changes as your business changes in grows
uh... but you know it's it's always that underpinnings of it is um... democracy
in the workplace and the people
school of business are also people who were there in the trenches working
everyday and we feel like what that does is you know it gives people an every you
know every minute
they're banking coffee or trying to collect money from people you know uh...
it's uh... they could see that incentive uh... tour to really
always when it when it to your best um... discussion when it happens for a
cut social
and political mission barger business um it's motivating to us and you know
they've got to see that everybody hears is equal
uh... contributor prosecutor keith s
organizational and ownership model that you could have a business uh... because
you know the people here are the people who are at stake in it
uh... and so
dash organized i mean like jigs
do you guys you could have been
you haven't seen
in some type of
hierarchical structure
ordered to
you and how do you you know how do you guys are bad like uh... yet hablar
we're gonna forgot
we're gonna buddha put out the uh...
new type of coffee were you know uh... the uh...
um... let's do some believe the inner let's do the field pierre reimi nic
howell
how granular is
the sort of the democratizing asian of every decision
uh... you know it's expert part of our processes been learning difference
between a collective uh...
management style in a cooperative ownership to bottle
everything we use to do what we are smaller everything i mean i choke
westview we weren't allowed to tire shoes without taking a vote from
everybody who worked as copy n
actually but it was a really small that worked great we call literally were in
the same room we call war every pack everybody rested everybody wore loafers
everybody workflow for if we were here you know
but uh... we grew and character up got a little bit more yet
technical week repackage stratified and and we took more people on and come
through this organic
management structures started to grow up
uh... and we've really hit a spot last year where
uh... we were sort of um...
the precipice of you know
we needed to develop a new model and understand what we're doing a little bit
better but didn't really have a to a secured none of us are business people
and we are robot really parcels reluctant but it
you know you know we had no training nobody hears really ever taken a of
business class cover so
um... figuring out how to go that collective management style which really
wasn't working anymore to something that was
you know a little bit more structured it we would really still likely shunned the
term hierarchical but uh... you know you can look at it and there are there are
people who uh... effects of production manager and and there's someone who's in
charge now of accounts and finance in yen
you notified by manage a couple people now and so
uh... it's bad
it is truly a to call the consultant and and uh... everybody had to just units
sit down and it was about six months and we're still going through it
uh... but you know we we've always had to be at at at uh... sort of the bottom
uh... of everything is whose so
the attention to that
democracy in the workplace and we still you know it's still very democratic
process
of it's just not as collectivity used to be with every single person being
involved in every position
um... jackson's uh... definitely still holding process but we devaluing
and think it's the best way to go
well matter really
uh... like again i was pre she ate the
thus or do you guys uh...
you give in and me and uh...
the shows that the part of of the years and
frankly i decide edge genuinely love your coffee which is why uh... we've
been able to maintain this
relationship for so long uh... because uh...
uh... by i'd only drink uh...
just coffee and uh...
um... and uh... through uh...
it's it's been a pleasure and
uh... you know it's i wish there were more
uh... companies out there
like you guys because uh... you the guys a i would love to
it's companies like yours that i've really sort of fuel
all promoting and uh... wrong things
the appreciated and uh... folks just copy dot coop i got i remind you ten
percent discount uh... when use the coupon code majority and uh...
also sublime the
tell you guys i appreciate of what you did um... you know you guys located
madison and of course uh... when all that went down you're help the people
out with coffee uh...
when they were a
ahead into the capital
so i i thanks for all the work you did
carter or pleasure
this is that for us to talk to network and politics and play and everything it
is the same two were we're really fortunate to be doing what we do and
we're really fortunate to partners like you also i'd appreciate it
uh...