Media, the nation’s first Fair Trade Town, marks 20 years supporting farmers in the developing world

Elizabeth Killough remembers the beginning of Media’s Fair Trade history as follows: She was sitting at her desk at UnTours, an unconventional Media-based travel company, next to her boss and UnTours’ founder Hal Taussig.

Taussig, sitting in his beloved rickety desk chair, began to share a vision with Killough: What if his hometown of Media could become a hub for Fair Trade, a global trading system that prioritizes quality products and fair wages for farmers in the developing world? What if Media’s shops and restaurants could stock products made and sold with equity and respect?

“I couldn’t even begin to imagine what that would be [like],” Killough remembers.

To humor Taussig, she Googled “Fair Trade towns” (the internet was remarkably slow in the mid-2000s, so it took a few minutes to populate the results, she said). An email for Bruce Crowther, the father of Fair Trade in Garstang, England, popped up. Killough sent him a note. Despite the fact that it was 10 p.m. in England, Crowther wrote right back. He wanted to help make Taussig’s dream a reality.

In the months that followed, Taussig and Killough would help spearhead an effort to make Media the first Fair Trade town in the United States, a push that took the cooperation of local business owners, civic leaders, and borough council members. As Media marks 20 years of its Fair Trade Town status, Fair Trade products, and Taussig’s formidable footprint, can be found all over the Delaware County community.

Fair Trade is a global trading arrangement under which farmers are paid higher wages in exchange for assurances that they’ll use eco-friendly practices, ensure safe working conditions, and invest in their communities. The trading practice seeks to uplift producers in the developing world, where environmental exploitation and forced labor can be common in the agriculture business. Common Fair Trade products include coffee, chocolate, and bananas.

Fair Trade guarantees farmers can charge minimum prices for goods, acting as a safety net against market instability. Some Fair Trade suppliers receive a “premium fund,” or an additional sum of money put aside to invest in education, healthcare, infrastructure, or business improvement products in their communities. In exchange for economic security, Fair Trade producers must provide workers with reasonable work hours, safe working conditions, and maternity leave, and are barred from using child and forced labor.

Fair Trade products are certified through a collection of governing bodies, including the Fairtrade International and Fair Trade USA.

Killough’s email to Crowther set off a monthslong campaign to make Media the United States’s first Fair Trade Town, a moniker now proudly displayed on “Welcome to Media” signs on the borough’s outskirts.

Taussig had been thinking about sustainability in the global economy for decades before Media’s formal designation. In 1992, Taussig and his wife, Norma, founded UnTours, an unconventional “slow travel company” that helped people connect to faraway lands through community engagement and sustainable tourism practices. Friends described Taussig as unique and empathetic. He was famously averse to making a profit, sharing UnTours’ returns with customers, staff, and, later, the UnTours Foundation, which invests in sustainable business ventures.

Taussig, who died in 2016, was “a really sweet man that cared about the world a lot,” said Ira Josephs, the executive director of the Media Fair Trade Committee.

Taussig and Killough began meeting with a group of stakeholders who shared the goal of bringing Fair Trade to Media. At the time, there was no organization overseeing Fair Trade communities in the U.S., so the Media group decided to “self-declare” under the criteria used by Garstang, the first Fair Trade Town in the world. They needed to convince a certain number of Media retailers to sell Fair Trade-certified items and ask local schools and businesses to use Fair Trade goods. The guidelines also required Media to establish a Fair Trade committee; have an elected body pass a resolution supporting Fair Trade; and promote media coverage and education around Fair Trade.

A number of stores in Media already carried Fair Trade products, and many of its churches and Quaker meetinghouses used Fair Trade coffee and sugar. The working group made a website and brought on board Monica Simpson, a borough council member who helped convince the governing body to pass a Fair Trade resolution. Borough council saw it as a way for “this local community to make an international connection,” Killough said.

Once all of the criteria were met, “We just self-declared that we were the first Fair Trade town,” Josephs said.

At the time, New York City and Los Angeles were working on their own Fair Trade proposals. Yet Media, a 5,000-resident borough in the heart of Delco, beat them to the punch.

“It was rebellious,” Josephs said.

On July 12, 2006, Media held a public ceremony unveiling its status as a Fair Trade town.

Many of Media’s businesses got on board.

When Tara and Brent Endicott, the owners of downtown Media’s Burlap and Bean, first got into the coffee business, they knew they wanted “to feel like we were making a difference,” Tara Endicott said.

All of the coffee sold at Burlap and Bean is Fair Trade-certified and organic, a decision the Endicotts made in 2006 when they opened their first location in nearby Newtown Square, inspired in part by Media’s Fair Trade push.

Though their coffee industry friends told them they were crazy for only stocking Fair Trade products, which are more expensive and harder to source, the Fair Trade beans won over the coffee purveyors and their Media-area customers.

Fair Trade lives on in the stores, restaurants, and coffee shops that dot Media’s bustling downtown.

All of the international products at Earth and State, a pottery and craft shop, are from Fair Trade groups. Bittersweet Kitchen, a pizza and brunch spot, serves Fair Trade hot chocolate and coffee. Mom-and-daughter-owned yarn shop Homesewn sells yarn from Fair Trade Federation members and other companies that follow Fair Trade principles. Even Trader Joe’s, located in Media’s old armory building, stocks Fair Trade coffee.

On Valentine’s Day, the Media Fair Trade Committee hosted its annual Fair Trade chocolate tasting. The committee also hosts an annual juggling contest with Fair Trade soccer balls at Dining Under the Stars.

Fair Trade’s future is not entirely certain.

Fair Trade groups have come under scrutiny in recent years for corporatizing a once mission-driven practice. It’s been hard at times to get businesses to splurge on Fair Trade goods, first during the 2008 recession and then again during the pandemic, said Killough. As rents rise in Media, there’s a “constant turnover of store owners and restaurateurs,” Killough added, making it an ongoing effort to keep Fair Trade practices alive.

“It’s going to continue to require a lot of work, a lot of commitment, and a lot of education,” she said.

Last year was “the worst year financially that we’ve ever had,” Tara Endicott of Burlap and Bean said. Despite having the highest customer counts in Burlap and Bean’s history, high coffee prices and tariffs left the Endicotts taking home meager profits at the end of the day. They’ve thought about opening up their business to non-Fair Trade coffee, but haven’t yet, relying on the hope that economic conditions will improve.

Ultimately, Brent Endicott said, he and his wife are proud to be in Media and to be serving Fair Trade beans.

Brent said, “We’re thrilled to be able to do our part to help Media stay a certified Fair Trade town.”

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