Apr 7, 2008 | Clients in the Media, Coconut in the Media
Fair Trade Company Shared Earth has donated £10,000 for the creation of the first sustainable community centre in India. Managing Director Jeremy Piercy handed over the cheque to the John Lally International Foundation outside Shared Earth’s head office in York, which is to fund a new community centre in Goa.
John Lally was extremely active in the environmental movement before he died in his late 20’s. He persuaded the council to give over a disused landfill site as a conservation area, and helped to raise several hundred thousand pounds to set up the UK’s first eco community centre on the site. This now forms the template for the Goa project.
The new Goa centre in Moira, will be promoting environmental education, sustainability, community enterprise, recycling and agriculture for all the community and also includes a kindergarten. Using an old Portuguese-style house renovated to 21st century standards, the Centre will be carbon neutral forming a community base for environmental enterprises in agriculture, recycling, garbage collection and other small scale non-polluting industries.
Shared Earth actively campaign against the use of plastic bags with their jute bags made in India which boast a selection of logos such as ‘Reduce, Reuse, Recycle’, ‘Use me till me bottom wears out’ and ‘Say No to Plastic Bags’. They also backed the Daily Mail’s Banish the Bag campaign which also formed part of their PR plan undertaken by Coconut Creatives.
“Fair Trade is making such a difference,” explains Jeremy. “Critics are quick to question whether the Fairtrade logo is just another way of businesses to profit. We are ensuring that the profits of our fairly traded goods directly benefit those communities that require assistance and this Goa project is a classic example.”
Apr 7, 2008 | Clients in the Media
Shared Earth fans were delighted to see a Shared Earth jute bag being used on the Gavin and Stacey show on Sunday 6th April.
It was used in a scene with the actor Alison Steadman, who plays Pam; Gavin’s neurotic Essex mum, as she entered her house with her shopping stacked into one of Shared Earth’s reusable jute bags.
“We’re delighted to see the bags being used, especially on the TV,” comments Jeremy Piercy, founder of Shared Earth.
Shared Earth campaign heavily for the reduced use of plastic bags and currently offer the reusable jute bags in a variety of colours with different slogans including ‘Reduce, Reuse, Recycle’, ‘Use me till me bottom wears out’ and ‘Say No to Plastic Bags’. They also backed the Daily Mail’s Banish the Bag campaign last month.
“We have always aimed to address the imbalance of wealth, working together with people from different cultures,” explains Jeremy who founded Shared Earth 1986 to increase the sales of fairly traded goods.
As well as being the UK’s largest independent retailer of non-food Fair Trade products, Shared Earth offer the best selection of recycled products, including bags made from crisp packets in bangladesh, toy cars made from tin cans in Madagascar, office stationery from computer boards in the UK, wall hangings from old saris in India and jewellery from recycled glass in Chile.
A selection of these products can be viewed at www.sharedearth.co.uk.
Mar 19, 2008 | Coconut in the Media
A new affiliate relationship has been announced this week between leading franchise consultants, Franchise Your Business (FYB) and marketing and PR specialists, Coconut Creatives.
This talented exclusive alliance has been formed to promote and support franchisors in their quest for growth.
Sarah Dyer, founder of Coconut Creatives, began working with FYB consultant Mike Gratwick early last year. Sarah headed up marketing and media campaigns to launch his new franchisor clients. Due to the success of this, the relationship has been formalised and rolled out across the FYB consultancy network.
“Franchise Your Business are delighted to be working closely with Coconut Creatives, we know that both our business and that of our clients will benefit greatly from this alliance and the superb service provided by Sarah and that of her team,” says Tim Mott, Director – Franchise Your Business.
The clients are the ones to truly benefit from this relationship. Success so far has resulted in eye catching headlines, a press trip to India, national and regional newspaper coverage, targeted magazine features, online recruitment campaigns and a trip to Spain planned next month. All achieved through projects between Coconut Creatives and Franchise Your Business.
The most recent success was seen this week after Coconut Creatives launched brand new Spanish franchisor and FYB client, Murcia Villas onto the UK market. “The campaign kicked off on Friday, just in time for the weekend. By Monday afternoon, Murcia Villas had 46 quality leads for their lifestyle based franchise,” explains Sarah.
The relationship is circular with FYB assisting former clients now working with Coconut Creatives on such activities as Discovery Days. “Affiliations are valuable to all businesses,” Sarah adds.
“Having a professional and customer driven PR and Marketing Company working with us is key to our development and critical to the success of our clients,” concludes Tim.
Case studies can be found on coconutcreatives.co.uk and www.franchiseyourbusiness.co.uk
Feb 19, 2008 | Coconut in the Media
Coconut Creatives were guest lecturers yesterday at Bournemouth University. The aimed to give students an insight into marketing for small businesses and being a small business.
The presentation included some background on the Coconut directors, two client case studies and information on what it is like running your own business. The highlights of the event included a short clip from a James Bond film that client Livett’s Launches managed on the River Thames and a clip from the Coconut’s recent India press trip with client, Shared Earth.
The Coconuts made the session interactive by taking along a range of Fair Trade products bought in India during the press trip and also a range of magazines which included client editorial and features.
The event also highlighted to students the positives and negatives of owning and running a business and concluded with a question and answer session which gave the students a chance to get some advice for their future careers.
Feb 17, 2008 | Clients in the Media
Customers to Jon Thorner’s Farm Shop were in for a surprise from Saturday 9th to 16th February as they discovered the ‘purple wall of weird’ located within the shop along with a range of tastings of delicious local produce.
Back by popular demand for its third year, Purple Love Week, Britain’s largest coordinated tasting event aimed at supporting hundreds of independent food retailers right across the country during a traditionally quieter time of year. An idea that was forumlated between Coconut Creatives director Sarah Dyer and Giles Henschel founder national food retailer Olives Et Al. This year the theme seemed to be ‘weird and wonderful’ with many other shops embarking on undressing with food or organising an independent stripper-gram to put some spice into local foods!
Jon Thorner’s ‘purple wall of weird’ included a range of items such as one of the famous purple love t-shirts, purple love postcards, a purple cowboy hat and even a purple bikini! The idea behind the wall was to display a range of purple items highlighting the purple theme. The ‘Purple’ was inspired by the Kalamata olive and the ‘love’ as it coincides with the week that Valentines celebrate!
“It’s been a great opportunity to show our support for local suppliers in order to promote West Country foods… our purple wall of weird has certainly attracted attention from customers and allowed us to think and celebrate the wealth of local foods available in this area,” said Jon Thorner.
For further information about Purple Love Week visit the website at http://www.purplelove.co.uk
