I was gonna wait to write about this fair trade film till I got to see it, but since it doesn’t seem to be screening in LA anytime soon, and interesting news keeps coming in…
Black Gold’s a film that juxtaposes the multinational coffee companies are getting rich while coffee farmers are being forced off of their land. Feted at Sundance, this film looks specifically at Ethiopia, and one man — Tadesse Meskela — who travels the world trying to find buyers willing to pay a fair price.
A company feeling the heat cuz of this film: Starbucks.
While the film producers say on their blog (here, and crossposed on The Huffington Post) that the film “has a much broader focus” and “does not actively take on Starbucks,” Starbucks clearly feels under attack.
Now the producers say they “tried relentlessly” to get Starbucks involved in the film when they were making it. Starbucks said no.
But when it went to Sundance, Starbucks “sent people to every screening and actively courted the media” and sent out press releases.
Black Gold producers say that the “pages of corporate spiel” they were given seemed to contradict Starbucks’ words about its great biz practices: “The figures showed that in 2004, the company was sourcing approximately 1.6% of its coffee under the fair trade scheme, while its website proclaimed that “Starbucks Announces Record December Revenues†up 22% during the same quarter of last year.”
To be fair, Starbucks is now at 3.7% fair trade. Woohoo.
In any case, I can’t wait to see the film. It sounds powerful: One person who viewed Black Gold told the producers she was dumping $10,000 worth of Starbucks stock and putting that money into committedly fair trade companies.
Another viewer, who doesn’t seem to have known about the Starbucks Challenge, was inspired to go in to a Starbucks to ask for fair trade coffee. You can guess how that went by the title of her blog post: “Why Starbucks Sucks.”
What I don’t get is why Starbucks just doesn’t do more fair trade. Make a serious commitment, and Starbucks can make these critiques go away even before they start.
Instead, the mermaid’s just putting more money and power into its PR machine. More on those efforts tomorrow –
Update, 6/14/06: Starbucks threw a PR party to try and win back some creds –
June 14th, 2006 at 8:16 am
I think all of this goes back to the fact that every Fair Trade campaign seems to be aimed at the giant — not at the industry as a whole (yes, even the independts that do not serve certified coffees).
Starbucks could do great things for coffee productin countries if they would suck it up and committ and I think people should continue to “encourage” that but I also think other shops should be encouraged as well.
I can’t wait to see this film, however. I will probably have to have the special headphones to hear it and some sort of large mag glass to see it as it will be 2050 before it reaches Bozeman, Montana.
..be bold
June 15th, 2006 at 9:12 am
Some time ago, you posted the memo from Starbucks’ head office about their fair trade coffee policy. Specifically, it outlined the company’s policy to brew fair trade coffee no questions asked when requested by a customer. I’ve been looking for it on your site but so far I’ve been unsuccessful.
Do you think you could repost it? I’d love to print a copy to carry around with me when I try to order coffee…
Thanks!
June 15th, 2006 at 10:24 pm
Hey Jason — I think the reason why Starbucks comes under attack is that it’s the biggest specialty coffee company. It also gets a lotta good press for its “commitment to fair trade,” but doesn’t live up to its hype. That tends to really piss people off, inspiring campaigns against the giant ==
Dread Pirate — Here’s a link to the memo :)
June 16th, 2006 at 8:15 am
I understand and I think it is good that people are encourage businesses to stay true to their mantras. I feel that there should be a widening of this movement, however, so that when you hear the words “a push for more Fair Trade coffee”, it does not spur only anti Starbucks thinking.
Lots of farmers need help and it seems the movement should be bigger than that.
The nice thing of these movements centering on Starbucks is that if they jump on — even 50% — and serve FT, it will makes worlds of difference — literally.
..be bold