Suma Wholefoods pioneer expansion of Ethical Consumer Best Buy Label

Ethical Consumer has announced that they are expanding their Best Buy Label scheme due to the continued growth of the UK ethical market. The company has launched the expansion with fellow co-operative Suma Wholefood’s new range of Italian organic pasta.

Suma’s new pasta range is the first product to be awarded Ethical Consumer’s prestigious Best Buy Label under the organisation’s newly expanded certification scheme – which will now include products which were previously not covered in their regular product guides.

Products will still be rated according to Ethical Consumer’s unique scoring system, which specifically looks at a company and its product’s environmental and ethical credentials. The certification of Suma’s organic pasta marks a unique triple for Europe’s co-operative movement as Ethical Consumer, Suma and the Italian manufacturer of the pasta are all worker-owned co-operatives.

Stephanie Motzek, Suma’s Commerce Compliance Coordinator, comments: “Here at Suma, we are individual members of our co-operative and also consumers. Working together with Ethical Consumer was insightful. We greatly respect the work they undertake as researchers, enabling the public to make better-informed buying decisions.

“Suma had the honour of contributing to this process review and development; it isn’t just about our products but about the ethical market as a whole and that’s something we’re very pleased to have been able to assist with.”

Nadine Oliver of Ethical Consumer adds: “It’s terrific that not only is Suma a workers’ co-op like ourselves but also that the company which makes the organic pasta is a co-op too. This shows that the co-op movement is right at the cutting edge of today’s ethical market.

“We’re increasingly being approached by companies to certify products and services in sectors that fall outside of our existing shopping guides. By expanding our Best Buy Label scheme we’re now opening up the possibility for us to award the Best Buy Label to a much wider range of products and services.”

Launched over 20 years ago, the Best Buy Label scheme has signed up almost 50 of the UK’s most ethical companies based on the results of Ethical Consumer’s product guides. The recognisable butterfly logo is only awarded to products with top scores; the Ethical Consumer scoring system rates products out of 100, starting with a company’s overall ethics and then takes into consideration a range of issues including supply chain management, animal rights policy, tax conduct and carbon reporting.

Suma currently has 20 Best Buy labels due to their outstanding ethics when it comes to supply chain management and their environmental reporting, scoring highly for all their products.