Recently I realized that I have not shared a very important success on my blog. My producer group, Ayni Bolivia, and I worked together and obtained funding available to fair trade groups wanting to expand their market in the US.   The Challenge of Meeting Toy Safety Standards I have blogged previously about toy safety.  [...]

When I started my business in 2004, I knew that I could not work alone. Almost as soon as I began selling my products in Toronto, I began to develop a vision of a group I called Faces of Fair Trade. I conceived of a group that would promote fair trade and provide a mutual [...]

People often ask me what it is like to import fair trade crafts from Bolivia. They expect to hear that I need to travel to Bolivia to do this work: they imagine an exciting life.  However, my life is quite ordinary– unless you do a body scan to uncover my two passions — for communicating [...]

Selling finger puppet pouches is really more interesting than it sounds. That is because I  often talk with kindergarten teachers and professionals who work with preschool children. These are  people who devote most of their waking hours to helping our children get off to a good start in life. They are a warm and friendly [...]