Environmental Considerations
Let’s start at the beginning. Well a beginning. Not the beginning. I jest - though, looking at events of the last few decades, one could argue otherwise. What follows is a list of considerations and initiatives that have been implemented at Eat Me.
Here come the bullet points
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We choose farmers, producers and suppliers that have an environmental and sustainable program over ones that don't. We try our best to visit all farms we source from. We like to meet the farmer(s) and dog(s) behind the produce. It's nice. Sometimes we share a meal too.
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We aim to buy well-produced/grown ingredients. Not everything has to be certified. We’ve found that many natural, organic farmers aren’t. Either because they can’t afford it, or because they don’t believe in certifications that allow all kinds of thing they would never use on their farms. Our style, get to know the farmers and find out what they use – a conversation is better than any certification. If you can’t talk to them, look for words like local, chemical-free, organic and biodynamic.
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More than a third of the significant suppliers we work with are owned by women or individuals from underrepresented populations.
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More than 60% of the company's expenses was spent with independent suppliers local to the company's headquarters. And if we look at the Cost of Goods Sold, we spent more than 80% within the country of operations. Pretty local if we may say so ourselves.
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Tamarind chutneys received Fairtrade certification in 2013 (only chutneys in Australia/New Zealand and 1 of 2 globally with such a certification), and ceased in Feb 2024.
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The organic spices have come from the Wayanad Social Service Society (WSSS) in Kerala, India. When international flying was a thing, Mum visited the society to say hi. Though we haven't made it as far as Uruguay, source of organic sugar. Zoom maybe?
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The cotton tote bags have been hand screen printed using eco-friendly Permaset inks that are water soluble and chemical free.
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Still with us? Cool.
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Typical recycled content of the 100ml glass jars is 27%. This % includes recovered bottles and jars for recycling, imported recycled glass and Calumite (a waste material from steel production).
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For our standard 250g glass jars it has an average cullet (internal process recycled glass) scorecard of 60% +/- 5%.
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Powershop is our electricity and gas provider - induction hobs available in the market aren't big enough for us to make the switch. And electric brats pans are out of financial reach. Soon enough.
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We have a slick rubbish program, sorting and recycling all possible waste. Goes without saying, any kitchen waste is sent to the nearest composting station.
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We choose organic and biodegradable staff amenities whenever possible, and they are all packaged in recycled cardboard. The toilet paper is all made from 100% recycled, post-consumer waste fibres - its called Who Gives a Crap, 50% of its profits are donated to Water Aid to build toilets and improve sanitation in the developing world. Eco Store and Dr Bronner offerings complete the bathroom/cleaning larder.
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All orders are shipped using Sendle's carbon neutral services, thanks team.
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Eat Me, a social enterprise, certified as a BCorporation in 2015 - the 67th company in Australia to do so. Since passing certification, Eat Me improved its score from 86 to 111 out of a total of 200 and was included in the 2018, 2019 and 2021 BCorp Best for the World awards – Community category.