Boston Tea Party, the coffee chain with two shops in Bath, has been named Britain’s Most Ethical Coffee Shop based on its approach to ethics and the environment.
The announcement was made by Ethical Consumer, the organisation which researches and rates over 40,000 brands and products to help consumers make informed ethical choices.
Reporting for Ethical Consumer, researcher Francesca de la Torre noted in her report into the ethical and environmental record of 15 coffee shop chains that: “When it comes to ethics, the cup your coffee comes in has become as big an issue as the coffee itself.
“Boston Tea Party, our Best Buy in this guide, has made a bold move and eradicated take-away cups altogether. Customers can either bring their own reusable cup, buy one at the counter or borrow one using the deposit scheme.
“It would be great to see more businesses follow in the footsteps of Boston Tea Party.”
Boston Tea Party achieved the highest score in the guide due to its sourcing, customer choice and approach to eradicating issuing single-use cups.
BTP’s coffee comes from Extract Coffee which uses a direct trade model; tea is directly sourced; hot chocolate is Fairtrade and organic.
BTP buys organic milk from Yeo Valley, offers soya and oat milk as an alternative to dairy at no extra charge to the customer, and all meat and eggs are free range.
Mintel recently surveyed consumers on their coffee purchasing, asking where they had bought a coffee in the last three months. Of the people surveyed, 48% had bought a coffee in Costa, 29% in Starbucks, 27% at an independent coffee shop and 24% at a fast food outlet.
Anita Atkins, Brand Director at BTP said: “It’s encouraging that over a quarter of customers are choosing to buy their coffee from independent businesses like BTP.
“Our own customers tell us they are motivated to choose us because we put a lot of thought and care into our sourcing, and we genuinely strive to make things better.
“We are incredibly proud to be leading the way when it comes to ethics and sustainability and would love to see all the big coffee chains which were included in this report adopt business models based on these principles.
“Now we need customers to vote with their feet by visiting cafes that are committed to ethical trading. If enough customers start choosing cafés based on ethical trading standards, the big chains which currently perform poorly in this area will be left with no choice but to change.”