be a more conscious consumer

I was so fed up with my bank that I’ve applied for an account (and for my boyfriend as well, who was surpisingly excited about it!) at a ‘concious bank’! They only invest in environmental-friendly companies, and other sorts of concious companies (not in companies who make fire-arms, of are involved in childs labour, that sort of stuff). So that’s great, and as I also have a concious mobile phone provider (10% of my phonebill goes to a good cause so now I never have to feel guilty about phoning too much!) and green gas and electricity, I guess I’m doing very well on this one!

bought fairtrade chocolate-stuff to eat on bread, organic peanutbutter and organic tea. didn’t even look at the price (ouch, I know it’s more expensive than regular food!), because I thought: I can afford it, so I don’t have an excuse to not buy it!

I was really broke but in desperate need of some new warm winterclothes and wintercoat. So I went to H&M to buy some stuff. Totally irresponsible in relation to underpaid labour in third world countries obviously, but a very wise decision for my wallet. OK, so I’m not a saint.
I did make up for it a tiny bit by buying some facial-products which were not tested on animals…

This is brilliant, a collegue brought a tray of Well water, which is a new Dutch brand (www.wellwater.nl, also in English) of water, with the slogan ‘feeling good by drinking Well’. Of each bottle, 25% of the money goes to a charity which constructs water wells in Africa and Asia. Great, huh?
It makes up just a tiny little bit for the fact that us Western countries use up way too much clean water, that we even flush our toilets with water lots of people in other countries would die (erm, not a good choice of words) for to drink!

I guess compared to other people around me I’m doing quite well on this one! Most products like shampoo, bodylotion, make-up etc. I buy are not tested on animals (I consciously search for those products), I have Kuyichi jeans (not made by underpaid Chinese of Indian people or kids), I bring my own (plastic or canvas) bags when I go shopping, I try not to buy stupid things I don’t actually need and will throw away soon anyway, I buy fairtrade products… But still, I could do so much better, it’s just that especially food and clothes are so expensive if you want the right stuff… Oh well, I keep on trying.