Why launch the Community Best Buy label?
We’ve been running our Best Buy Label for almost 30 years. Whether you're looking for an ethical bank or coffee company, the Best Buy Label has become a gold standard for guaranteed ethical shopping in the UK.
But the ethical economy is changing. Sustainability-focused brands (some more ethical than others) are more visible than ever, but there is also a growing ecosystem of micro businesses, sole traders and small collectives which are quietly doing things differently. These enterprises are often deeply rooted in their communities, experimenting with new models of ownership, low-impact production and fair trading relationships. Yet many of them have been locked out of formal certification schemes – including, to an extent, ours.
There are practical reasons for this. Until recently, we only certified companies which have been rated in our shopping guides. These guides are designed to help readers navigate national markets, so they tend to focus on better known, widely available companies in a sector. There is only so much space for niche alternatives, however inspiring they may be.
For example, there are around 12,000 independent coffee shops in the UK, some of which are super-ethical. Our latest shopping guide to coffee shops only covered 16 national chains.
We will of course continue to rate and feature small scale alternatives in our magazine guides – the new label is an extension of our coverage of ultra small businesses, not a replacement for it. The Community Best Buy is however limited to companies with a total annual turnover of under £100,000, so targets businesses which are much smaller than the vast majority of companies in our guides.
Smaller businesses like these also face structural disadvantages when it comes to certification. Detailed policies, formal reporting and specialist staff time cost a lot of money. How many sole traders can afford a sustainability team, or the hours needed to complete lengthy application processes?
But we know from our decades of experience that size is not a proxy for impact or integrity. Some of the most innovative and ethically grounded work is happening at a small scale, precisely because these businesses are closer to their suppliers, their workers and their customers. If we are serious about building an economy that works for people and the planet, we need ways to recognise and support them.
Ethical Consumer has been expanding our focus on Challenging Corporate Power in the past year, and the new label is part of our ambition to move away from large scale for-profit corporations, and to think outside the box to imagine a different economy.
