Local Business Promotes Trick-Or-Treating With a Cause

Usually trick-or-treating can go one of two ways: the person who answers the door supplies a treat, or a trick is played on that person. The most beneficial for both parties seems to always be the treat.

But for some Easton residents this year, they may be receiving candy in addition to giving it. The program, "reverse trick-or-treating," was started by Equal Exchange, a worker-owned co-operative located just over the Easton town line in West Bridgewater. In addition to candy, the homeowner receives an informational flyer about child labor overseas in the cocoa business.

Daniel Fireside, the Capital Coordinator for the business, took his daughter Ximena "reverse trick or treating" last year.

"I think sometimes people are a little suspicious at first, like ‘what are you handing me’, but when they see a little kid their guard is down already," he said. "We would stand back and see people turn it over and see that there was chocolate and have a big smile. A lot of people would recognize the company and they were familiar with us, and they usually thanked her."

The practice, which Equal Exchange started five years ago with Global Exchange, was intended to raise awareness to the cause and encourage residents to buy fair trade products, said Kelsie Evans, the Chocolate Products Coordinator for the business.

Evans said that when the business started 25 years ago, the idea of fair trade, a social movement that promotes helping traders and workers in developing countries, was fairly new.

"Now fair trade is really common," she said. "You hear about it at Starbucks or at Wal-Mart. At that time it was something different – this idea of working directly with a small-scale farmer cooperative, paying a stable, more fair price and helping with things like more financing and credit to help farmers."

The business, which sells chocolate, coffee, tea and bananas, was started by Massachusetts natives Rick Dickinson, who still helps run the company, Jonothan Rosenthal and Michael Rozyne in 1986. It moved to Easton's back-yard five years ago, Evans said.

She said employees come from diverse backgrounds.

"People did environmental studies or anthropology or were a barista at a café and have a passion for coffee," she said. "It’s a real mix but I think we’re all committed to this idea of doing business where it benefits everyone involved."

Even Equal Exchange's current Co-Director Rob Everets didn't come from a traditional business background. Everets, formerly an activist who worked to eliminate death squads in Central America during the late 1980's and early 1990's, saw joining the company as another way to promote change to current economic practices in third world countries.

"At that time I became aware of what Equal Exchange was doing to try to build a more equitable economic model in that region because economic inequalities were really at the very source of why there was so much injustice," he said.

Everets said that the key to supplying fair-trade food through the business is just a matter of educating people.

"Most people are pretty removed of where it comes from," he said. "They don’t know the conditions of where things are grown and sourced, especially overseas or on the Ivory Coast, and there’s a lot of 'a-ha' moments when people kind of connect the dots and figure out what we do."

What it all boils down to, Evans said, is fairness. Those who produce the products deserve an equal and fair wage, she said. Reverse Trick-or-treating is just another way to help the cause and grow awareness.

For Fireside's daughter Ximena, nobody understands fairness more than her.

"I think it’s really easy for kids to understand the concept of fairness and that you get what you work for," Fireside said. "For them, this just makes sense."