In early 2019, Carved Culture joined the British Association for Fair Trade Shops and Suppliers (BAFTS), an important milestone in our growing understanding of responsible sourcing.
As our range of handmade products from around the world expanded, we wanted to better understand the people, practices and principles behind the goods we sold.
Learning From Our Suppliers
Our introduction to BAFTS came through one of our existing suppliers, whose membership first drew our attention to the organisation. We had already chosen to work with that supplier partly because its commitment to fair trade mattered to us.
That discovery encouraged founder Ryan Bomzer to explore what fair trade actually meant, how sourcing practices could be assessed, and how businesses could demonstrate their commitments rather than simply make claims.
Taking Responsible Sourcing Seriously
Working with suppliers and makers across different countries made ethical considerations particularly relevant to Carved Culture. We wanted to think not only about the products themselves, but also about the people involved in making them and the long-term sustainability of sourcing them.
Joining BAFTS in 2019 was a step toward learning more about recognised fair trade principles and demonstrating our commitment during that period. Membership provided an external framework for considering our sourcing practices; it did not mean that every individual product carried a separate Fairtrade certification.
Part of Our Business Journey
Our BAFTS membership was part of Carved Culture's development from a general secondhand retailer into a business sourcing handmade goods internationally. It helped shape the questions we asked about suppliers, production and responsible trade as the company continued to evolve.