Posts Tagged ‘Transparency’

New owners for FairMail!

Saturday, December 9th, 2017
The current and future owners of FairMail

The current and future owners of FairMail

Take a seat while reading this huge news: after more then 11 years FairMail founders Peter and Janneke are ready to take a step back and hand over “their baby” to new owners. “We noticed that our energy for some of the business aspects of the company was diminishing. And that this also blocked our inspiration for new creative ideas in business development. We believe that FairMail deserves new oxygen and energy to keep on unleashing its potential. Apart from that we also felt that both of us had a craving for some new personal development, outside of FairMail.”

“This is a huge step for us which we have been working on for quite some time now. After some investigations we found a team of 3 young women who will take-over FairMail per 1/1/2018. They are super motivated and all three of them know FairMail from the inside, as former volunteer photography trainers in Peru. 2 of them are German and 1 is Italian. They will set up a new FairMail company in Germany. As founders we plan to stay involved from the side in a Board of Advice. The 3 women will take over all of the daily work and we trust and believe they will follow the philosophy and ideas on which we based the FairMail concept.”

FairMail founder Janneke being thanked by the teenagers

FairMail founder Janneke being thanked by the teenagers

“It feels very strange to leave the company and at the same time it feels healthy, for two main reasons.  Firstly because with this take-over FairMail is able to continue and hopefully to keep growing with the 3 new shareholders and their new energy and ideas. Secondly because of the new freedom we will have to develop ourselves in new areas. Peter wants to work more with his hands, build wooden surfboards and eco-homes, while Janneke wants to continue specializing as an adolescent coach and -trainer.  We won’t be the “father and mother” of FairMail any longer but assume a new role as “grandfather and grandmother”. We are very grateful that things worked out this way!”

“To make sure that the hand-over goes smoothly and that neither our customers nor the teenagers are affected negatively we have been training the new owners for the past months already. From December to February we will continue the training while working together in Peru during the actual hand-over.”

If you have any questions please don’t hesitate to contact us by clicking here. Peter and Janneke can be contacted for private messages after the first of January via peterdenhond@gmail.com and Janneke.smeulders@gmail.com.

FairMail General Year Report now available on-line

Monday, June 27th, 2016

As fair trade guaranteed member of the World Fair Trade Organization, FairMail has transparency as one of its core values.

We believe that all our customers, teenagers, cooperation partners and of course YOU have the right to know all about FairMail’s activities, what the results are and the effects of all of this on people, planet and profit. Please feel free to have a look at FairMail’s 2015 Annual Report (in English) by clicking here.

We have also updated the extended Frequently Asked Questions section on FairMail’s website for those who really want to know ALL the details.

Read FairMail’s annual year report over 2015 here

FairMail’s impact as you have never seen it before

Monday, June 27th, 2016
FairMail's impact from 2006 - 2015

FairMail’s impact from 2006 – 2015

FairMail dreams of a world in which ALL adolescents have equal opportunities to educate and develop themselves.

In our last newsletter you already read about the impact you help to create by purchasing FairMail’s fair trade photo products.

But as an image says so much more than words we asked the JAM Academy to develop this cool visual explaining FairMail’s input, activities, output, outcome and impact so far.

Click here to view the full screen version

FairMail wins Transparency prize

Monday, October 26th, 2015
FairMail founders Janneke Smeulders and Peter den Hond receive the cheque

FairMail founders Janneke Smeulders and Peter den Hond receive the cheque

Yes, we did it! FairMail won the first prize for the social enterprise with the most transparent website about its social impact. During the award ceremony in The Hague on the 30th of September the president of the jury, Mr Herman Wijffels, handed over the cheque of 10.000 euro to FairMail founders Peter and Janneke.

The prize is an initiative of Price Waterhouse Coopers to stimulate social enterprises to communicate transparently about their social impact. PwC investigated the websites of 60 social enterprises and judged them along criteria like communication about their business model, their social impact, the risks involved and the use of storytelling. In the end FairMail, from the 3 finalists, was chosen as the winner by an independent jury.

You can read more about why FairMail won by clicking here.

FairMail wins the Transparency Prize 2015

FairMail wins the Transparency Prize 2015

The prize money will be used to invest in adapting FairMail’s website to mobile devices and to find the necessary new business leads at international trade fairs next year.

We are very happy with this result. We couldn’t have made it without people helping us: we want to give a big THANK YOU to UNITid for making the interaction design of the FairMail website, TOOK Web development for actually programming the site and the Social Capital Foundation for providing the loan to invest in our new and transparent website.