The first ever Fairtrade Business Awards were announced by the BBC’s George Alagiah in a ceremony on the 12th March 2012. 

Essential received the award for Best Fairtrade Office whilst Bishopston Trading Company and The Greenhouse B&B also picked up awards.

The ceremony took place at Bristol’s Leigh Court and was opened by Bristol City Council leader Barbara Janke. The awards highlight the accomplishment of regional Fairtrade businesses and demonstrate that ethical businesses are achieving consistent success.

Summer 2012 will see the launch of a very different kind of currency:  The Bristol Pound.  Essential  will be accepting Bristol Pounds as payment from our valued local customers. We at Essential have decided to jump on board with the Bristol Pound because it offers support to Local Independent Retailers. It will boost the local economy by keeping more money within Bristol and so make Bristol a stronger, wealthier community. 

The primary purpose of the scheme is to strengthen the local economy by giving an advantage to independent locally based businesses. The people of Bristol have a strong sense of identity and civic pride. This scheme will tap into and build upon that, raising the profile and importance of supporting local businesses. 

Essential is closed for trade on Monday May 7th, Early May Bank Holiday and Monday June 4th, Spring Bank Holiday.

Please note the following changes to our delivery schedule to see how you might be affected.

MONDAY DELIVERIES
All usual delivery runs will be moved from the bank holiday Monday to the Tuesday.  
Please place your order at your usual time for delivery on the Tuesday.
The sequence of Cornwall deliveries is unaffected.

TUESDAY DELIVERIES
If you normally receive a delivery on a Tuesday, please note that because we are closed on the Bank holiday Monday you will need to place your order by 11.00am on the Friday.  Orders faxed or emailed or submitted online after 11am on the Friday will not be delivered until the Tuesday of the following week.

Please enquire with our customer service team if you would like further information.
QUEEN’S DIAMOND JUBILEE
Tuesday June 5th 

After discussion with a number of our customers we have decided to stay open on June 5th, the day of the Queen’s Jubilee. Deliveries and all activity at the Warehouse, Fishponds HQ will be unaffected.

AT OPEN DAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 2012

Essential Trading is hosting an open day for the independent health food trade on Sunday September 16.  This annual event will be particularly special this year as the celebration marks the finale of Essential’s 40th Anniversary Year.

Essential will throw open the doors to its HQ in Fishponds, Bristol to welcome its suppliers and customers alongside ethical and natural product organisations.  This relaxed, informal event will include a food exhibition and tastings; special promotions on selected lines, a Christmas preview and a delicious organic lunch courtesy of the food exhibitors.
Guest speakers will talk on a variety of subjects and the Essential Trading team will all be on hand to share some social time with valued suppliers, customers and professional partners.

The Essential Trading Ruby celebration welcomes family members of its guests: a free children’s entertainment area will run and there will be activities for youngsters including face painting to keep them happy.  Like all the best parties, guests will leave with a goody bag and gift voucher.

The biennial open day is a highlight in the Essential calendar and we always enjoy seeing our suppliers, customers and their families in this relaxed setting. The Open Day is a celebration as well as an opportunity for networking, making introductions, picking up offers and trading with our like-minded guests. This year is particularly special as we celebrate the end of the Ruby Anniversary year. 

We hope to see plenty of people celebrating our achievements which are, in no small part, the result of our successful trading partnerships with the many guests invited from across the health food trade. It is also a wonderful opportunity for Essential to thank valued customers who have been so vital to Essential’s success over the past 40 years.

Roberto Rospo 0845 458 0201
openday@essentialtrading.coop

Palestine may not be commonly associated with its wealth of olive groves and almond trees. Yet despite its troubles, this beautiful, fertile country continues to produce some of the best quality olives, olive oils and almond crops in the world.

Zaytoun is a leading fairtrade producer whose commitment has helped secure the livelihoods of many farmers and their families.  Established in 2004, it helps Palestinian farming communities to thrive despite the difficulties imposed by the Israeli occupation.   Its mission is not only to help the farmers produce, pack and export their products but also to expose the severe social and economic disadvantages they continue to face.

To highlight its work and to encourage people to taste its products, Riziq abu Nasser, an olive farmer from the Deir Istya cooperative is visiting the UK for a Fairtrade Fortnight tour.  He and his colleague, Zaytoun Palestinian director Taysir Arbasi, will be talking about the importance of fair trade practices among the Palestinian farming communities across the West Bank.

Essential Trading - one of the UK’s leading wholefood suppliers – has great respect for the Zaytoun produce and is a key partner in the distribution of olives, olive oils and almonds to independent health food stores.

Essential’s own health food store Harvest (Situated on Gloucester Rd, Bristol) – is delighted to be hosting a visit from Riziq abu Nasser and Taysir Arbasi on Wednesday March 7th from 12.30pm to 2.00pm.  Customers are welcome to drop in between these times to meet Riziq and Taysir, find out more about the production of their food and sample the products.

Palestine is the home of the olive tree with some groves as old as 2,000 years. The climate produces succulent olives, rich oils and large almonds.  The farmers work tirelessly to bring their products to market and Essential are only too pleased to provide a channel to the UK and European markets for them. We work with many fairtrade cooperatives across the world but it’s a rare treat to have them here in the UK to speak about their work and to sample their own products. We will give them a very warm welcome here at Harvest Bristol and hope many of our customers will find a few minutes around lunchtime on March 7th to drop into the store to support the Zaytoun Fairtrade Fortnight Tour. 

A number of Essential Trading’s own label Essential goods have been awarded the coveted Best Buy Label by Ethical Consumer; the UK’s leading ethical and environmental consumer magazine. The following product ranges have been selected for the award:

Organic Pasta
Organic Vegetable Oils
Organic and Fairtrade Basmati Rice
Organic and Fairtrade Jasmine Rice
Canned Fruits in Fruit Juice
Canned Pulses in Water
Tinned Tomatoes
Toilet Paper
Kitchen Roll

Ethical Consumer uses an extensive data base and conducts exhaustive research to rate companies and products against 20 stringent animal welfare, environmental and human rights criteria. The Best Buy Label is becoming increasingly recognisable by consumers who can trust the products bearing this logo to be genuinely ethical.

We are delighted to once again have a number of our products awarded The Ethical Consumer Best Buy Label. This independent accolade underpins our ethical ethos and provides the standard by which consumers can make truly ethical buying decisions. As we celebrate 40 years in the business this year, it’s encouraging to mark our Ruby Anniversary with renewed confidence from the Ethical Consumer Best Buy Awards.

This year, Essential trading are donating to Caring at Christmas for the 13th successive year.  Caring at Christmas is a registered charity that helps homeless people at Christmas and throughout the year. Over the Christmas week, they run a Christmas Shelter for people who are homeless or vulnerably housed in Bristol. This includes accommodation, food, medical services and entertainment.

Essential Trading has invested £100,000 in a new solar PV electricity system from Solarsense at our Fishponds warehouse in our latest effort to minimise ourimpact on the environment.

We are an ethical company committed to the welfare of the planet.  The installation of solar power panels at our factory HQ in Fishponds is the next logical step for our business  - we are keen to harness all environmentally friendly advances in technology.

Essential chose Backwell-based Solarsense to supply our 44.64 kWp system that comprises 186 solar photovoltaic panels mounted on the roof of our warehouse.  The solar PV (photovoltaic) technology captures the clean, natural energy of the sun.  When the sun hits the panels, it creates an electrical field within the layers of the panels.  This electrical field is converted to AC (usable) electricity and is taken up by the various demands for electrical power within our factory, warehouse and offices.

We are paid 32.9p/kWh for all electricity that is generated and we are then free to use this energy. Any surplus electricity is then exported onto the grid and Essential is paid 3.1p/kWh for this.

The solar PV at Essential Trading will generate an estimated 38000 kWh of electricity per year.  This represents a saving of approximately 513 Tonnes of CO2 over the 25 year life of the FIT (Feed in Tariff – the Government scheme where businesses and home owners are rewarded if they invest in renewable electricity).  The cooperative borrowed the money to fund this project from ethical bank Triodos.  With the Government’s Feed in Tariff, the cash generated from the system will mean it pays for itself during the 10-year loan payback period and will thereafter be a source of income.

We are delighted to have our solar power panels up and running now after all the months of planning. We strive to produce and distribute the most sustainable food and non-food products and rigorously check the source of each ingredient so it makes perfect sense for us to tap into the world’s source ingredient for life – the sun – to power our business naturally.

Essential has commissioned five brand new recipes to mark its annual Healthy Eating Fortnight (October 17-30, 2011).  Each recipe uses a number of health food store ingredients and comes complete with tempting photography and a clear nutritional breakdown.  
They have been created by highly regarded nutritionist Christine Bailey and include:
•	Muesli Slice
•	Pesto Butterbean Burgers
•	Chocolate Tahini Fudge
•	Butternut Squash, Coconut & Chickpea Curry with Toasted Coconut Flakes
•	Berry Coconut Cheesecake
The recipes have been produced individually on glossy A5 100% recycled cards to attract consumers while being easy for retailers to display on shelf.  They will provide a perfect talking point for retailers who can encourage their consumers to buy the key ingredients and try the recipes at home.  The recipes will also be in downloadable format for trade customers from the recipe page at www.essential-trading.coop from September 1st 2011.
These recipes are designed to encourage people to try new ingredients but also to experiment with familiar ingredients in a new way. Christine has created some very interesting dishes to inspire people to use a number of health food store ingredients creatively. 
Healthy Eating Fortnight is all about raising awareness of health foods and encouraging people to look afresh at the diverse range of ingredients available at their local store.  We hope these enticing and professionally produced recipe cards will help retailers drive interest in their healthy ingredients and boost their sales.   
The Essential Healthy Eating Recipe Cards will be available to Essential customers. While they are designed to be used during Healthy Eating Fortnight, they will not date so can be displayed for several weeks to maintain interest throughout the autumn and even up to Christmas with the Chocolate Tahini Fudge, Butternut Squash, Coconut & Chickpea Curry and Berry Coconut Cheesecake recipes particularly worthy of festive entertaining.
To order your recipe cards, contact:
Local rate - 0845 4580201
T: 0117 9430 800  
E-mail: sales@essential-trading.coop
Order Online:  www.essential-trading.coop

As you know, the variety of olive called Kalamata has been available on the UK market for years, and to some extent Kalamata olives are synonymous with Greek olives per se, because up until now this olive variety has been produced in more than one region of Greece, not just in Messinia, the region of Greece of which the city Kalamata is the capital.

Now though, the Kalamata olive has achieved Protected Designation of Origin status (PDO).

PDO status is intended to allow producers  to promote their products as having  special characteristics that are largely the result of coming from a particular geographical location, and so getting better prices on the market.  This arrangement also provides the consumer with assurances when buying products with PDO status, as regards these characteristics, as well as production, processing and geographical origin.

Kalamata olives are in fact a variety of the Kalamon Olive, and the trees that they are grown on are called Kalamon.  Now, only olives grown, harvested and packed in an area within a 10 mile radius of the city of Kalamata can be named Kalamata olives, and these olives should bear the PDO symbol.

All other olives that up until now we have known as Kalamata olives, will be named Kalamon olives.  Because  the designated PDO area only produces 1200 tonnes of olives per year, bonafide Kalamata olives will become an expensive, luxury olive, which is something the producers want.
 
But rest assured that where a product you once knew as a Kalamata olive becomes a Kalamon olive, they will still have exactly the same characteristics as they always did.

It's our bees....  We LOVE our bees.... Unlike most honeybees in New Zealand these days, at Wild Honey Organic, our bees are 100% 'free  spirits ' whose beelines (genealogy) have roamed and bred undisturbed for centuries  in literal paradise within a 2-3 km radius of their organic hives nestled  in the virgin manuka wilderness of Northern Coromandel, NZ. Their colonies know every flowering plant source and sparkling fresh water streams within their
reach. Not only can you taste and smell this pure freshness in every jar
of Wild Honey Organic's 100% raw, bioactive, unpasteurised manuka, our
bees pass this knowledge seamlessly on to their next generation.... How
amazing is this?  
Search the online catalogue for Wild Honey
The 15+ is on Promotion Sept/Oct
and please do LIKE us on Facebook by clicking the weblink above.
   
In just a few weeks we have a quickly growing UK audience and so if you have an online part to your business, or stock us in your retail store, email us with your link and we will add this to our page.

Essential Fairtrade Light Tahini has been nominated for Best Fairtrade product in the Your Healthy Living product awards! By voting you will enter a free draw to win one of every winning product from each category. Vote for your favourite product by visiting the website linked above.

Ecomotive is a Bristol based organisation which is supporting people with the opportunity of building their own home. With the increasing need to think about our environmental impact, and the economic problems the country is in, building your own sustainable and affordable home is a possible route for those looking to live more sustainably as well as having the chance of being actively involved in the creation of the place you are to live in. 

Ecomotive recently had a space at Glastonbury Festival where the Bristol crew built a timber structure (see photo) which housed an interactive map, information on self build and a library of relevant books and reading material.  Essential Wholefoods supported Ecomotive with the Glastonbury project through the provision of snacks, tea and juice for the team to keep them all going.

The event was a real success with hundreds of people visiting the stand and talking about their dreams and desires to build their own home and discussing practicalities and land availability with the Ecomotive team. Ecomotive is planning to take on a piece of land in the near future to create a sustainable housing development, where the future inhabitants are part of the process.  

If you would like to be involved sign up to the Ecomotive forum on www.ecomotive.org.   

Sprouted seeds are packed with amino acids, proteins, enzymes and vitamins and are the freshest food you will ever eat, organically grown, carbon footprint friendly and even cheaper than chips! Essential 3-Day Sunny Sprouting Salad Mix (M700Y) and 6-Day Sandwich Sprouting Mix (M701Y) are clever combinations which will naturally sprout and be ready to eat at the same time.  Most popular is the 3-day sprouting mix* which contains Mung Beans, Chick Peas and Sunflower Seeds, whilst the 6-day mix* is stronger in flavour, containing Broccoli and Alfalfa Seeds. 

Download your free sprouting guide from the resources page of this website.

This year Essential Trading were delighted to have Rose Elliot cooking with the Essential brand in the Natural Products show organic kitchen.

Rose Elliot first made a unique Thai curry using the quinoa, which she simply dropped into the coconut milk and curry paste base. Next up was a fabulous Essential luxury nut mixture based nut pate (raw), topped with Essential’s wonderful apple-infused cranberries. This was presented on fresh leaves.

Rose Elliot then demonstrated a feature on sprouting, using the 3 day and also the stronger tasting 6 day sprouting mix, showing how easy and what fun it is to use these little power-houses of protein and nutrition. The finished sprouts were arranged into a lovely layered salad which also included the olive oil pre-soaked Essential sundried tomatoes, pine nuts & olive oil. This was then topped with a smooth lemon & light Fairtrade organic tahini dressing which is an inspiring and nutritious alternative to mayonnaise.

Finally, Rose demonstrated a chocolate mousse based on avocado (you can't taste the avocado, it just gives creamy richness without any dairy) and the lovely Essential Fairtrade organic cocoa powder plus a dash of coconut oil. This was studded with the Essential raw cacao nibs, raspberries and mint. A rich indulgent treat with none of the calories you would expect.

For more information and recipes please visit the associated link.

Essential Trading will withdraw its business from any retailer selling fur products. Fur farms have been banned by the UK Government since 2003.

Our trade and consumer customers buy from us in the knowledge that we are an ethical company, which provides not only good quality products but from ethical sources. We are a company who mirror our customers’ core values and beliefs and reflect these in all areas of our commercial practice.

Our commitment to this ethical commercial practice naturally extends to those trade customers we sell to.  When any seller, or retailer creates an environment hostile to our ethical convictions, that commercial relationship ceases. 

 “We hope to create a world where we can live comfortably together without the exploitation of the Earth and everything that lives in it;” remains a key tenet of our mission statement.

Watch out for our newly expanded range of split cases! These will be indicated by the usual asterisk * instead of the ‘x’ sign by the case size. If you order a selection we will pack them for you in a distinctive Essential cardboard box which will keep them safe and is fully returnable. Recycle your boxes by sending them back with your driver and we will re-use them for sending your next order.

You can now access a unique set of Essential promotions via our login customer area. Visit www.essential-trading.coop, sign in using your unique customer details (or register if you haven’t already) and you can choose between browsing the catalogue, weekly price changes, catering/ vegan/ fairtrade/ and gluten free product lists and best selling lines.

A hot topic in the news this spring is the sustainability of palm oil. Essential believes it is vital that palm oil is produced on a sustainable basis. As such, we ensure our suppliers are committed to this cause. We do not approve of the destruction of forests for the growing of palm oil. We believe that palm oil can and should be produced on a sustainable basis which in no way threatens the existence of forests and orang-utans. For more information on our sustainable palm oil policy please see the link on the homepage.

“We′re committed to helping businesses throughout the UK reduce their carbon footprint. Switching electricity supply is a huge step towards this important goal. So join us, make a difference and be in good company!”

Essential Trading is proud to buy its energy from Ecotricity, a power company dedicated o changing the way electricity is made.  

Of the big 6 energy companies, the average spend on new sources of green energy is just over 1% of the average annual electricity bill.  Ecotricity is a company committed to making that figure look as inadequate as it truly is:  Ecotricity spend 100% of our electricity bill on building new sources of green energy, and are the only green power company actually building sources of renewable energy.  Visit ecotricity.co.uk and whichgreen.org for the valuable efforts made by this great company.  

Ethical Best Buy: 
Ethical Consumer is the UK’s leading ethical and environmental consumer magazine. Using the Ethical Consumer’s extensive database, their researchers rate both the product and the company behind the product against more than 20 animal welfare, environmental and human rights criteria. 

We are proud to be awarded the best buy logo on the following Essential brand products:

Mexican Coffee (Org) (ft) B894P 6 X 227g *
Guatemalan Coffee (Org/ft) B896P 6 X 227g *
Olive Oil (ev/cp/Org) O031P 6 * 500ml *
Olive Oil (ev/cp/Org) O032P 1 X 5ltr *
Sunflower Oil (cp/Org) O033P 6 * 500ml *
Sunflower Oil (cp/Org) O034P *
Sesame Oil (cp/Org) O035P 6 * 500ml *
Safflower Oil (cp/Org) O037P 6 * 500ml *
White Spaghetti (Org) P901P 12 * 500g *
White Penne Organic P902P 12 * 500g *
White Fusilli Organic P903P 12 * 500g *
White Tortiglioni Organic P904P 12 * 500g *
White Lumache Organic P905P 12 * 500g *
Wholewheat Spaghetti Organic P906P 12 * 500g *
Wholewheat Fusilli Organic P907P 12 * 500g *
Wholewheat Penne Organic P908P12 * 500g *
White Penne Organic P909P 1 X 10Kg *
White Fusilli Organic P910P 1 X 10Kg *
White Basmati (Org) (ft) R088B  1 X 5kg *
White Basmati (Org) (ft) R088X 6 x 500g *
Jasmin White Rice (Org) (ft) R111E 2 kg *
Jasmin White Rice (Org)(ft) R111X 6 x 500g *
Jasmin Brown Rice (Org) (ft) R112E 2 kg *
Jasmin Brown Rice (Org)(ft) R112X 6 x 500g *
Luxury Toilet Tissue X444P 9 x 4 *
Luxury Toilet Tissue X445P36 x 1 *