Easy Shopping the Ethical Way

One of our minders has a birthday coming up and we couldn't think of any better place to search for a present than the Traidcraft mail order catalogue. There is just so much choice of lovely and exotic fair trade gifts, ranging from lovely patterned clothes to equisite wall hangings and carvings, jewellery and items for the house and garden. And the great thing is that these gifts are absolutley unique -you won't find them in the shops.

Sorry, but we can't tell you what we're getting our minder as she might read this. However, we can reveal that we're giving up buying nutella, having recently found out some of the awful things that go on in the cocoa platations, and are putting in a big order to Traidcraft for their fair trade chocolate hazelnut spread.

If you want to do the same checkout www.traidcraftshop.co.uk

Love from all at Bears Unlimited xxx

Please Support Fair Trade Fortnight

As we hope our readers are aware, it's currently Fair Trade fortnight. We, at Bears Unlimited, are very enthusiastic supporters of Fair Trade products and we really want the growers of the products we enjoy, to earn a fair wage. We can't bear to think of it being otherwise.

Yesterday Rocko and I (Chelmer) popped along to our local Morrison's supermarket where we usually shop. We wanted to make sure that Fair trade fortnight was being properly advertised in the store and there was lots of attention drawn to fair trade products.

We got off to a good start, finding an advertising board in the shop entrance.


However, we did have to turn it round as we thought it important that shoppers saw it as they came in, not as they left (there was a different advert on the other side).

As we toured the shop, we did get increasingly disappointed. Although there were fair trade products on sale there was nothing to draw attention to them and no promotional material.

We will have to write to Mr Morrison as we don't think it is good enough. We hope you will do the same if your supermarket is not giving enough support to fair trade fortnight.

In the meantime, talking of Morrison's, Blue Bear is currently checking out Bearmobile 2 as she was filled up with petrol on the very day the fuel scare hit the news. Paws crossed everybody!

Lots of love Chelmer, Rocko and the gang xxx

Shopping the Swedish Way

On our way home from our Derbyshire adventures we were treated to one of our favourite shopping experiences: a trip to the Ikea store at Nottingham.

East Anglian readers will straight away appreciate why this is such a treat; it is because there are no Ikea stores in East Anglia (good job there are other things to recommend it).

We like Ikea as it is a very bear friendly store, even so there are certain features that we particularly like. We think it is great that they provide lots of computers to allow us catch up with our blog entries after being away for a few days.


We also like the bright and cheerful design of the bedrooms which makes us feel at home and we always appreciate the chance to make new friends, including in this picture our new friend Croc.


We'd also like to applaud Ikea, not only for the lovely Swedish meatballs served up in their restaurant, but also some of their wacky and innovative products. Our favourite from this recent trip were the inflatable animal cushions which we demonstrate to you in our final picture for today.


Our visit nearly ended in disaster, however, when Rocco nearly came a'cropper in the store. You'll have to read our next entry for the dramatic details!

Lots of love, George, Yorkie, Chelmer & Rocco xxx