Fair Trade Sports

I've been waiting to announce this to y'all. My good friend Scott has launched the first Fair Trade sports equipment company in the US, partnering with the first-movers in the UK, Canada, and Australia/New Zealand. All their sports balls are certified to be stitched by adult workers paid fair wages and ensured healthy working conditions. They offer guilt-free soccer balls, footballs, rugby balls, volleyballs, and more.

I caught up with him recently in Seattle and got to hear first-hand about this cool new venture. He sounds surprised with this entrepreneurial first, but in many ways it doesn't surprise me at all. He's always had a head for business and over the years was always a great understudy to his dad who's also got a great business mind. He knew he wanted to be involved vocationally in social justice causes since the early 1990s, and the guy's not even 35 yet. I digress.

The initial inventory of footballs, soccer balls, volleyballs, and rugby balls are due in from Pakistan mid-September. Fair Trade Sports will spend the first 18 months focused on sales to K-12 youth sports leagues, college campuses, and web consumers.

Fair Trade Sports’ website is now live — "primarily an educational platform to teach US consumers about Fair Trade and how it applies to sports balls (e.g. no child labor involved, fair wages for adult workers, reinvesting profits back into local communities)."

Here’s the kicker.
He and his wife (the lovely and talented Susan) are donating 100% of their after-tax profits to children's charities. This is the same idea behind the Newman's Own brand.

If you're a reader of soupablog and influence the purchase of sporting equipment for schools, youth sports leagues (like if you coach a kids' soccer team), or just want a new football to toss around, please support fair wages …

Join the Movement! Subscribe by sending mail to:
[email protected]

www.fairtradesports.com

Comments

[danny]

Very cool. I spotted the button in your sidebar a couple days ago and wondered what it was. Now I know. Did you help design the site? And if so, was it wordpress? it looks like a wordpress site. Just curious.

[paul soupiset]

paul ingram at ingram labs designed his website, and yes, it does look like wordpress to me.

[paul soupiset]

(i just designed the button for my own purposes)