Ethics is one of those words that gets thrown around constantly in business. Countless brands claim to be ethical (us included), but here's the complication: ethical isn't a standard. It's basically an opinion, and the goal posts sit wherever each business owner decides to put them.
So this post is where we put ours. This is what it means to us, Wildflower, to run an ethical business, eight years in.
Prioritising people
The first thing in every business decision we make is people. That starts with the people farming and manufacturing in our supply chains and ends with our staff and customers. Everyone along the line gets respect, kindness and fairness beyond legal obligation. Legal is not the same as ethical, and we hold ourselves to the second one.
We work closely with a small number of manufacturers, and we've visited them in person to walk the floors, meet the people, and make sure we're on the same page. Long relationships, direct communication, no anonymous supply chains. Our whole mission is showing people their value. That can't stop at the counter.
Prioritising the environment
Minimising environmental impact as a small business is genuinely hard, and it's something we've worked on and improved every year since 2018. Where we're at right now:
At the cafe, we've encouraged reusable cups from day one with a 50 cent discount, and around a quarter of our daily coffees now go into them. Our takeaway cups are fully home compostable. And our Milk Juggler means 10 litre milk bladders instead of tonnes of plastic bottles (the Juggler system has saved over 55 million 2L bottles and counting across cafes like ours).
At the store, every piece of apparel ships in a 100% compostable dust bag inside a compostable mailer (we've tested them in our own home compost). Our courier is carbon neutral. And our reusables range, the cups, tumblers and bottles, exists specifically to talk people out of single use plastic.
Partnering with people who share the load
We don't make everything we sell from scratch, so who we partner with matters. Glee Coffee know their farmers by name. Hero Packaging make our compostable mailers. Sendle offsets every delivery. The Milk Juggler crew are ending plastic milk bottles. Ethics compounds when businesses hold each other to it.
An honest conclusion
Ethics in business is an infinitely hard challenge. It's expensive, slow and complicated, and we're still improving. But treating people and the planet with love and respect is non-negotiable for as long as Wildflower exists.
Next time you buy something, big or small, take an extra minute to look at who you're supporting. Check their website, see where they stand, ask questions. Small changes make big differences. You can see everything we do on our ethics page.