Fairtrade organic olive oil company Zaytoun has had a busy year. They've become the first olive oil to be awarded the Fairtrade mark. Co-founder Heather Masoud won the Times Readership prize in the Women in Ethical Business Awards and the business won the 2009 Arab-British Culture & Society Award.
But one of Zaytoun's biggest decisions this year might be finally moving into a proper office, after five successful years functioning out of its workers' homes in London and Oxfordshire.
It's a big decision to make. Finding the right premises can take up business time and energy, and then there are the additional costs of rent, utilities and generally maintaining an office. For many freelancers or small business-owners, there's a lot to be said for operating from home, especially if you're doing a job which doesn't involve much in the way of material items.
On the other hand, there is a point when entrepreneurs decide that having their living room piled high with stock, the kitchen sink clogged up with experimental products and the computer in the corner of the bedroom humming away, demanding that you send 'one last marketing email...' is just too much.
At Visionary Soap, Monica Norley has also been through one of the big contradictions for the small business owner. “Obviously I started out cooking this up in my kitchen,” she says of her growing range of lusciously-scented soaps and body butters. “But now I'm talking to big retailers and possible investors, and that's quite scary, but I think it deserves to go further...”
But it can be good for us as consumers to know that our favourite ethical products started life being worked out by people who are really passionate about what they're doing. As Visionary's fellow Fairtrade toiletry company Bubble & Balm puts it, “our company started out with our founder making products in her kitchen (it's amazing what you can achieve with a food processor and a double boiler!)” they boast. “Although we've now moved on to using bigger and more sophisticated pots and pans (which are actually quite similar to their kitchen equivalents!), all of our products are still made in the UK by partners who share our ethical approach. Our soaps, for example, are hand-made using very traditional methods - there's no squishing together pre-packaged soap noodles into bars for us, even if those noodles are triple-milled!”
As well as getting boxes of business goods out of the house, taking your working life elsewhere can yield other benefits, from networking with other professionals and hearing about new jobs, to simply having a more businesslike look to your location and premises.
“When we set up the co-operative nearly two years ago it was mainly about just getting to work outside our flats and bedrooms,” says Hannah Berry of ethical co-managed workspace Openspace in Manchester, which like The Melting Pot in Edinburgh and Hub in London and Bristol offers freelancers and small businesses a desk and facilities in a shared office. “But one of the unintended benefits has been that lots of people here have heard about pieces of work from each other or formed working partnerships, and the networking aspects of having the space have become a big selling point too.”
Sarah Irving [www.sarahirving.net] is a freelance writer, based in Manchester and specialising in social and environmental issues and the Middle East
article links
http://www.zaytoun.org
http://www.visionarysoap.co.uk/
http://www.bubbleandbalm.co.uk/
http://www.openspace.coop
http://www.themeltingpotedinburgh.org.uk/
http://the-hub.net/
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