Tactile
Interiors has launched a new range of products for their eco friendly website
and at least 70% of that product range is from British Designer/Makers. 
The new products range from recycled glass vases to locally grown flowers.

All the products at
Tactile Interiors are natural, recycled or recyclable, sustainable or ethical
and at least 70% are sourced from the UK.

So why does the company
choose to buy British? Tactile Interiors believes that by buying and selling
locally and choosing British designers, it is able to reduce transport miles
and bring you stylish home accessories from local craftspeople.

Gordon’s
Gin Recycled Glass Vase,

made
in Devon.

You can now order fresh British flowers
from Tactile Interiors.  The bouquets are made weekly with the latest
flowers available.  Buying these flowers is a great way to support
British growers and is a more environmentally friendly choice than buying
flowers grown overseas.

The
very best of British Cut flowers

Gillian and Kevan Trott became involved in sustainable design and construction several years ago.  They saw Mike Reynolds (the visionary behind a fully sustainable building design called an earthship} speak in Brighton and decided to help promote his concept in Europe.  The buildings incorporate a large amount of waste materials in their construction.  They are also buildings which are self-sufficient for power and water and a large amount of food is also produced on site.

Kevan worked as Mike Reynold’s European Associate to develop
the earthship concept in Europe for over 5 years.  They have been
involved in developing earthships in Holland and Scotland.  The
company, Earthbuilds has evolved from the original earthship concept
using new technologies and materials and ways of working.  There is a
strong emphasis on Permaculture which is at the heart of the
organisation.  The Normandy earthship was the first project which was
completed in June 2OO8.  The earthship in Zwolle was completed in an
amazing 13 weeks last Autumn and progress on the current earthship in
Glasgow can be checked out on the Earthbuilds Facebook page. 
Earthbuild workshops are being run later this year in Portugal and
Poland.  A number of projects are also in the pipeline for 2O1O
including a 5 earthbuild development in the Orkneys, as well as
planning applications being processed in Nottinghamshire, Cornwall,
Gloucester and Holland.  

Earthbuilds is a public limited company with a strong emphasis on education, information sharing and networking.  

Design
and planning applications are undertaken by Kevan, they are developing
a Euro Crew for construction and Gillian runs workshops, courses,
co-ordinates volunteers and develops promotional material.

Kevan
and Gillian are based in Brighton but built their own earthship with
initial assistance from Mike Reynolds, in Normandy France.  They are
involved in developing this type of construction in Northern Ireland,
England, Scotland and Wales, France, Holland, Portugal and Poland so
far. They are in the process of developing opportunities in other
European countries in the near future.

See www.earthbuilds.com
for information about construction.  Earthship ‘Perrine’ is available
for rent so that earthship living can be experienced first hand see www.earthship-france.com and up to date information about developments can be found on the Earthbuilds Facebook page.

August 2009 newsletter 15% off online

Welcome to our August newsletter we hope where ever you are you are getting a little sunshine.

Using the website for online orders

All customers if you haven’t already done so, firstly need to register
with the site by going to Sign in via the Home Page then contact me via
email jim@simplysoaps.com
or telephone during office hours, 01603 720869 to be set up to see
trade prices online, we will respond confirming that we have set you
up, so that when you log in again you will be able to buy Simply Soaps,
Hedgerow Herbals and Faerie Flames at trade prices. Current prices
shown are mail order prices in bulk.

The benefits of buying online is that it is quick and easy,
carriage is only £2.50 instead of the usual £5, and there are no
minimum orders. Plus we are offering a further 15% discount off your
order total!!* Simply type in the word: trade15 in the discount code
box at the checkout and you will be entitled to 15% off your order.

NO MINIMUM ORDERS

Due to the increasing
demand for our products and in order to keep refilling those lines that
sell more quickly, our retailers have asked us to reduce the minimum
order value from £100. So we are more than happy to oblige, there will
be NO MINIMUM ORDER AMOUNT. Laurence Campion for the company says that;
‘this will help in the current climate plus some of our lines out sell
others, so now customers don’t have to wait before re-ordering.’

E-charger was picked as one of the three best portable chargers by the Metro on Friday 10th July 2009
Here is what they said
E-charger Pack this compact emergency charger and you’ll never be caught out with a dead phone, BlackBerry or iPod.£15, www.echarger.co.uk

Echarger Ltd is a small company
aiming to make a big difference to the environment by offering a range
of environmentally friendly – and extremely useful – battery and
mobile chargers for people on the move or out of reach of a standard
power supply.

Offering the following products: 
- emergency charger 
- solar mobile charger  
- solar bags ranging from business bags  
- messenger bags  
- city style bags  
- pouch  
 
Echarger’s range of fashionable, energy efficient and solar travel
chargers is available in a variety of formats to suit a wide range of
portable gadgets.  
 
The solar mobile charger, emergency charger and solar bags supplied
by the business are just right for any occasion. Available on the website,
the products are beautifully constructed and last for life.  
 
Echarger Ltd has an expanding network of clients, located in and around
London, including Eco friendly sites. The company is managed by Tony
Momoh who has been focusing on the business for many years. Having previously
worked for the IT industry, Tony Momoh is more than qualified to look
after the company.  
 
With a fully fitted workshop and fully qualified staff, the company
provides a professional b2b to businesses. The service is designed to
cost effective, enabling clients to make a difference to save the planet
economically. 
 
 Link to product review article  

http://www.lifegoggles.com/1738/echarger-emergency-charger-product-review/

Appearing
this month on the shelves in WH Smith and Borders nationwide, new eco-living
directory BOOK OF GREEN is the most comprehensive guide for everybody to
genuinely and easily green their lifestyles.

With
the general public currently becoming more receptive to living a more
eco-friendly life, this completely free guide points the consumer in the right
direction – it includes hundreds of approved ethical providers in a wide range
of sectors including business services, health and beauty, home and garden,
green energy, travel, parenting and food & drink.  All the companies
in the directory are in some way mostly or completely environmentally friendly,
sustainable, fair trade, organic,  ethical and socially responsible.

Book
of Green is intended to show everybody how to easily reduce their carbon
footprint, live a healthy lifestyle and make  a personal positive 
impact on the environment by integrating truly ethical products and services
into their daily home and family lives.

With
an initial print run of 30,000, the guide comes in a handy A5 format and is
printed in vegetable inks on 100% recycled paper.  An online flip magazine
version is also available at www.bookofgreen.com 
 Book of Green will be available in WH Smiths this July, attached to the
front of Permaculture Magazine as well as distributed across the UK in high
street eco stores, online eco stores, and at events during the summer as well
as at the Eden Project and the Kent Eco Village, the Kent Show by The
Ecologist, July 17-19.

Book
of Green is co-founded by Sue Jueno (founder of Allthingseco) and Katie Keegan
(founder of One Green Earth),
 whose combined experience of 6 years in the eco/ethical business arena
has given them the experience, knowledge and contacts to create a guide for
green living which everybody can trust.

“Being
green is more than reducing the threat of climate change, it’s also about
ethical trading and personal health.  The companies found within Book of
Green provide solutions across all sectors through their products &
services to help build a positive foundation for your family’s future
generations,”  says Katie Keegan.

“With
credit crunch in mind and a passion for promoting green shoot businesses we
have made Book of Green extremely affordable to advertisers and free to the
public to show off exceptional companies that are solving environmental
problems and that will be leading us into the future,” says Sue Jueno.

A REGIONAL EVENT WITH INTERNATIONAL REACH
As ministers abandon plans to publish a community empowerment bill, Smart City Futures will give those communities a voice! It will bring together Global leaders from business, policy and research for a desperately needed, honest and open conversation about connectivity, collaboration and community empowerment.

WHO WILL BE THERE?

 High Level International Speakers Include:

Melissa Sterry                 CEO, Societás, UK
Prof Takeda Shuzaburo    Exec Director, Business Universities Forum, Tokyo
Veli-Pekka Niitamo          Research Director, NOKIA IT Living Labs, Netherlands
Prof Paul James              Director Global Cities, RMIT, Melbourne
Lesley Gavin                  BT’s first female futurologist, UK
Prof Carolyn Kagan         Psychology and Social Change, MMU, UK

WHAT and WHY?
A lack of transparency and a silo mentality is resulting in a global political, environmental and economic meltdown
Open,
honest debate and knowledge sharing will help global communities to
climb out of these economically and environmentally challenged times
Smart
City Futures will provide an honest, open forum that will break down
the walls between policy makers, industry leaders, Universities and the
communities they serve. Together they will explore open innovation and
talk about how to build the foundations for a more sustainable future
Day
3 of Smart City Futures, designed by Just-b. Productions, will bring
b.TWEEN magic into the mix to pull crucial conversations into the 21st
century at this landmark forum
Using web 2.0 technologies, this
innovative event will show how Universities can walk the walk and act
as catalysts for change. Smart City Futures will give communities a
voice and a chance to interact in real time with global leaders

All speakers will be able to answer unmoderated questions in this rare chance to talk directly and honestly about our future

NEW CHALLENGES CALL FOR NEW SOLUTIONS: What makes SCF different?

This
event will be packed with installations, conversations, workshops,
brainstorms and one to ones. Moving away from traditional formats,
technologies will invite participation and interaction throughout.
Sessions will look at a range of thought provoking topics and themes
such as:

Professional Futures: Innovation and Collaboration in the Professional realms;
Policy Futures: Towards a Framework for Sustainable Economies;
Community Futures: Empowering Communities

Suffering from dry eczema itchy skin or psoriasis? Try
the Oregon Grape Tincture. It’s a natural herbal remedy that is made
especially for treating skin diseases. Nature Sense have a promotion on at the
moment - 50% off the original price!

Oregon Grape is a bitter, astringent, decongestant herb that
stimulates bile flow and releases toxins. Interally for skin diseases
(especially dry eczema), gall bladder complaints, chronic hepatitis B,
catarrhal gastritis, and diarrhea. The Oregan Grape tincture has much
better desired effect on eczema and psoriasis if used combined with Oregon Grape ointment.

Oregon grape is an evergreen shrub found growing throughout the
American northwest. While this plant is not actually a grape plant, it
is grown in Oregon. Oregon grape is a close relative of the barberry
plant and has many common medicinal uses and constituents.

It is a very special herb that has been put together in the simple form of tincture and ointment.

Ingredients:

Wild – crafted Mahonia aquifolium (Oregon Grape) tincture1:2 w/v (dried) in 45% organic ethanol

Extra Information:

A new range of Tinctures made by Paul
Richards who has been growing medicinal plants for nearly 20 years. The
herbs are grown organically in the beautiful Welsh border country of
West Herefordshire. Herbs are harvested in peak condition, carefully
chopped, and infused in organic grain alcohol. He puts 1kg of herb in
1.33 litres of alcohol is the maximum concentration normally 

Half price offer ends on 30th June 2009. is extended to 10th July 2009

The Recycle
Warehouse is an online department
store that is championing the environment and fighting climate change.
Their object is to be the next John Lewis, except that every
item at The
Recycle Warehouse is made
from recycled materials. 

The Recycle
Warehouse was launched this
year by John Halladay.

‘By buying from us, you are relieving
pressure on the world’s diminishing resources. Our inventory includes
chairs made from recycled cardboard, shoes from recycled tyres and whole
dining services made from recycled glass and much more.’

Six months after its launch The Recycle Warehouse displays hundreds of items –

‘…about 400 at the moment, still
increasing, all of which are made predominantly or wholly from recycled
materials. We have a rule that the items must have at least 50% recycled
content but most are much higher.’

Although it is a distinction that John
doesn’t make on the website his goods fall into two categories. On
the one hand it is easy to see what some of his things originally were.
Take a footstool made from recycled tyres, the tread is clearly visible
around the edge. It’s funky and loud and a real conversation piece.

‘This is taking something which had
a defined use and subverting it into something that is functionally
completely different. On the other hand, some of our furniture or our
tableware bears no relationship to the original use to which its raw
material was put. People can make a statement – I’m a hardcore
environmentalist: look at my
wastebin, it’s made from crisp packets! But they can buy a bed
or dining table that’s made to their own design from reclaimed timber
by a professional craftsman, that doesn’t look any different to a
conventional, well-crafted piece.’

‘Our goal is to show that every day
goods can be made from recycled materials and that they are just as
good as new. As well as the quirky – bags made from chewing gum wrappers
or ringpulls, bowls made out of remoulded LP records – we have beautiful,
functional furniture that is handmade from reclaimed wood, including
oak and teak which you just can’t buy any more in a sustainable way; 
designer clothes made from recycled fabrics, that can’t be bought
in any High Street shops.’

Many of the goods on sale through The Recycle Warehouse are made by charities.

‘Doy Bags are one of the best
known manufacturers in the recycling market. Made by a women’s collective
in The Philippines, their bags are colourful and exciting, woven from
reclaimed fruit juice packs. We supply garden furniture made by a charity
in Oxford that employs people with learning disabilities, and we support
other charities in various parts of the world.’

It’s a quirky site that makes its environmental
message clear on every page and it isn’t above being dogmatic about
climate change. This isn’t just about profit. 

At The
Recycle Warehouse they have
simple principles:

• sustainability comes first,
  profit comes second;
• business has to lead the way
  in the war against climate change;
• recycling is an alternative
  to the exploitation of the world’s finite resources
• this isn’t commerce, this
  is a Crusade.

John Halladay is a Board Member of Friends
of the Earth and a local Greenpeace activist.

Ethical Junction member Bags of Change has some Weleda goodies to give away.
Buy a Bags of Change eco shopping bag via www.bagsofchange.co.uk and get a FREE full size Weleda Sea Buckthorn Creamy Body Wash (RRP £6.95) with your order. 
Plus, your new bag will get you discounts at some of the UK’s best ethical independents - saving you up to 10% off your shopping basket every time you shop.

Weleda’s
Sea Buckthorn Creamy Body Wash is a revitalising blend of
antioxidant-rich biodynamic sea buckthorn oil and oranges, mandarins
and grapefruit from pure essential oils.
Sea
buckthorn is a particularly nourishing oil and a rich source of
anti-ageing pro-vitamin A and vitamin E. Sea buckthorn encourages
cutaneous cell-renewal thereby assisting the skin’s natural
regeneration. Gentle on the skin as well as the environment.

According to online travel agent responsibletravel.com, holidaymakers’ confidence has improved over the last three months as almost a fifth
(19%) of its total customers have gone ‘late’ and spontaneously
enquired and departed within a four week period. Furthermore, over a third (37%) of customers have travelled within eight weeks of first enquiring about their holiday.

These four week late booking figures reflect a rise of almost a third (31%) compared to the same period last year and almost a fifth (20%) for eight week late bookings.

The increase comes at a time when tour operators and airlines have
already reduced capacity for the upcoming season and across the year in
general. The late availability holiday deals that are on offer are
being snapped up fast and according to Justin Francis, managing
director of responsibletravel.com, it marks a pronounced increase in consumer confidence:

“There is no doubt that times were tough over the winter and
consumer confidence was severely affected as a result. However, these
figures are a sign that holidaymakers’ confidence is definitely
improving. While it’s far too early to call an end to what might be a
long recession it’s clear that in recent weeks more people are coming
into the summer market looking to book and depart at short notice. Some
will be disappointed that they cannot get their first or even second
choice holidays as airline capacity has been reduced.”

 Those countries topping the list for late bookings are: England; Italy; Morocco; Spain; France; Turkey; Wales and Greece.

responsibletravel.com
work with over 300 tour operators across the globe, from small
specialist operators to some of the larger, more mainstream travel
providers.

See

www.responsibletravel.com/latedeals