Amey and Ethstat change lives through delivering 14,000 hampers

09 Dec 2021

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Social enterprise Ethstat is set to complete the delivery of 14,000 environmentally and ethically sourced hampers, bringing positive social impact to the local community. This project will benefit 53 disadvantaged people who live in or around Croydon – including both homeless and unemployed individuals and, support social enterprises across the UK who have fulfilled the large orders. 

Ethstat was enlisted by leading infrastructure services and engineering company, Amey, to put together a Centenary Hamper for each of its 14,000 employees that would honour the best of social enterprise and meaningful procurement whilst marking the companies 100^th year. The products contained needed to give back to the communities they came from, be fully sustainable and support small businesses to grow.

As a community interest company reinvesting profits to end homelessness, Ethstat firmly believes in the power of the pound in making positive change to people’s lives. As the country looks to build back from the financial and social impact of the pandemic, it is clear that in order to improve lives, social value must play a key role procurement going forward.

Amey’s partnership with Ethstat to produce the hamper in this way resulted in:  

• 2,185 hours of living wage employment  
• 53 disadvantaged people accessed work  
• 2,140 hot meals for the homeless 
• 17 social enterprise delivery drivers employed 
• 91.6% spend with a social purpose 
• 2 full time staff employees 
• 106 hours of certified training 

The packing days have supported Evolve Housing, Lives Not Knives as well as the product suppliers for the hampers themselves.  

Yasmin Halai-Carter Co-Founder, Ethstat Ethical Stationery CIC, commented: “Through the power of Amey’s procurement, we have delivered 14 sustainable and social products for their Centenary Hamper with commercial viability. What’s special about this work is that it has enabled us to give back to our homeless and vulnerable communities, take tens of thousands of pieces of plastic out of production and launch innovative products through scale. Our social enterprise supply chain have been closely supported and this work has created some magic; a feeling amongst our UK supply chain that big businesses care and it’s time for change. This is the beauty of partnership at its best and we applaud Amey for their heart and vision. Thank you for giving us the opportunity to do what we love most.”

Bruce Halai-Carter Co-Founder, Ethstat Ethical Stationery CIC, added: “The breadth and the scale of this project is simply astounding.  We are incredibly proud to have brought together a consortium of social enterprises and extraordinary businesses that extends from Inverness to the southwest, from Hereford to East Anglia. Each is serving their communities as we do ours.  Using the power of Amey's procurement, we are fulfilling the promise of the big society.”

Head of Social Impact, Amey, Emily Davies, commented, “As a large organisation we know the difference our purchasing decisions can make to people, to communities and towards protecting our natural environment. This project demonstrates the very best of impactful procurement, that in this case has enabled social enterprise to flourish and made a genuine difference for people in need. We’re really pleased to be able to celebrate our centenary in a partnership with EthStat, that both gives back to our amazing employees and supports our local communities.

A selection of the companies included in Amey’s Centenery hamper are:

Spare Snacks - A social enterprise committed to saving unwanted produce and create healthy snacks. Spare Snacks create delicious, thoughtfully produced fruit and veg crisps. 1500 packs of crisps will be donated to sheltered housing residents

Nemi Tea’s - Nemi is a specialist tea company that supports refugees by giving them work and education opportunities. Nemi believes that good taste starts with good business, so they make premium tea products that spark enjoyment and create opportunities for refugees to shape their journey.  This order helped fund the salary of their newest staff member, Ashkan, a refugee from Iran.

Boundless Nuts - Boundless is a Bristol-based company that provides the tastiest activated fruit and nuts and supports FRANK to bring clean water to some of the world’s most impoverished people. FRANK works to improve safe water, sanitation and hygiene in India and Nepal.

Divine Chocolate - Divine are a female-led social enterprise that supports predominantly female Coco farmers through fair trade, education, and environmental support.  Divine chocolate has been palm-oil free since 2013 and has taken a leadership role in conserving the rainforest areas of West Africa. Due to the scale of the order, Divine created an ornate celebratory bar for Amey and reduced packaging that removed two single used plastics for each bar.

Refuge - Refuge is a freedom fighting chocolatier. Refuge exists to help give people a brighter future through their support of Flourish NI (a Northern Ireland based anti-human trafficking charity). Refuge donates proceeds to Flourisusinessh and provides survivors of human trafficking an opportunity to get involved in the business.

Jamila's Ethical Coffee - Providing products for the Amey hamper allowed us them to press go on a forward PO to our tin manufacturers and bring the plastic-free, sustainable vision to life. As a result, the order of 13,350 tins quickly grew to over 27,000 coffee tins for us with other customer orders, and this is all thanks to Amey. 100% of the profits from the tin is supporting families living with Dementia.

Elsa’s cake - Elsa runs a small social enterprise that helps people experiencing mental health issues, a subject close to her heart. Elsa and her team have lovingly baked each of the cakes by hand. All proceeds from the sale of the cakes go towards Mind the mental health charity.

Two Farmers Crisps - Two Farmers use local produce; the potatoes they grow themselves, local flavourings, low food miles and protecting their rural community whilst giving local employment and training. Brought to you in a world-first compostable packet.

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