Working
in any city means that food choices are limited. Other than bringing in a mung
bean salad every day, what’s a Hippyshopper to do? Turns out that Pret a Manger offer a healthier and
hippier choice. Why: you can get wholemeal bread, light or even no
mayo, less plastic/more card packaging, wooden spoons, organic milk, fairtrade
coffee and sandwiches made in the stores with fresh, GM-free ingredients delivered daily. They even give all
leftovers to charity. I don't know why I haven't been to Pret for ages but if
the mung bean salad doesn't survive the journey then Pret is where I will be from now on.
The perfect answer to healthy food on the move. [written by CityHippy]
but they're 1 third owned by McDonalds
http://www.hoovers.com/free/co/factsheet.xhtml?COID=103213&cm_ven=PAID&cm_cat=OVR&cm_pla=CO4&cm_ite=pret_a_manger
Does that make Pret's actual business behaviour any less ethical?
Surely the way to a more ethical world is to support ethical behaviour and not to waste time worrying who makes money from ethical behaviour?
As more money is made from ethical behaviour we will see more ethical behaviour taking place.
Thoughts?
CH
glad to see this post as i went to Pret for my lunch yesterday and felt very guilty about the whole mcdonalds things.
City Hippy, I think the difficulty is that the profits made from prets ethical policy effectively fund some of McDonalds unethical policies (rainforest clearing etc) and so I think I'll be off to an independent sandwich place next time...
Hi Philn
Life is not black and white. Sometimes we cannot make the perfect choice.
Given a choice between Pret and somewhere independent AND more sustainable I would of course choose the latter.
But when it is a choice between ethical and unethical I feel compelled to go with the ethical choice. Regardless of who makes money from it.
What a nightmare...
Namaste
CH
Pret, like so many other chains, are simply greenwashing. While they may use a bit more brown bread, and a bit less packaging, they are taking over the high street by "carpetbombing" their shops in, driving out the independents and competition.
Pret are just Starbucks in another guise, who are in turn just McDonald's in another guise.
Si M
PS - Plus their veggie sandwiches taste like dreck ;-)
Whilst Si M has a point, if you're stuck in the centre of most big cities, in the shopping area, you are unlikely to be anywhere near an independent retailer. It's one of my main gripes about my local shopping area (Princes St, Edinburgh) that if you happen to be there, you are pretty stymied if you want somewhere cosy and atmospheric to get a bite to eat.
You can get round the souless centre of town by not shopping there...but if you happen to work there it's not so easy. crappy short rat race lunch breaks bring out the worst in us.
Sometimes you have to make the best of a bad situation. If all of McD's customers went to Pret instead then McD's would probably end up one of the biggest purveyors of fairtrade coffee. That's surely better than the status quo, even if it's not the ideal?
Hi PsiMonk & Laputain
PsiMonk: I think it is easy to dismiss Pret and others as greenwashing but they are by far and away the most ethical option for me and many others I am sure.
Some ethical is better than no ethical in my book.
As Laputain indicates it is about making the best choice that one can, there are no perfect choices. We do the best we can.
Namaste to you all for a fascinating debate. Is it over? Anyone else got anything to add? Come on, don't be shy now...
Namaste
Al
Si's points remind me of Naomi Klein's comments on greenwashing in No Logo. He's right - especially the 'carpet-bombing', saturating an area with stores - but the hard reality is that if there's no alternative you should at least go with the more ethical mainstream option. That's my opinion, anyway!
I think that for a company to sell part of their equity to McD and then to portray themselves as the "ethical mainstream option" is a little off...
I know they source good fresh food, are a good employer, and give any unsold sandiches to homeless charities at the end of each day... but these are all things that make their choice of bedfellow somewhat unusual, don't you think?
they're spreading into the US too leveraging on McD's knowledge of retail property, marketing and advertising - they are in prime position then to go global and mirror Starbucks success...
I don't know, I used to go to Pret regularly before the McD deal, now I'd find it difficult to reconcile myself with going there - even as a last resort...
Glad it's making for a interesting debate though
Just a small point - it's only the filter coffee that's fairtrade. I've been writing to them a lot about this but with no luck so far.
Re the carpet-bombing - I'd rather see a pret every 200 yards than a Subway, McDonalds or Tesco.
Re McDonalds - it does leave a bit of a funny taste in the mouth. However, I'd argue that it's probably better for McDonalds to be investing in a 'greener' business like Pret rather than opening more of its own stores.
I agree Adam...more ethical is always better than staying the same or less ethical.
It is a lot like the Green & Blacks sale to Cadbury's. Am interviewing Craig Sams, the owner of Green & Blacks, on my site currently and it turns out that Cadbury's helped G&B's organic cocoa suppliers expand production.
Without this help from a mainstream unethical company G&B might not have survived and a competitor might have stolen their market share.
The moral of the story is that sometimes one has to have strange bedfellows to achieve one's objectives. Especially in business.
Namaste to you all
Al
Where could I find a list of unethical fast food resaurants. Im concerned with steroids in chicken, hormones in the cows, cruelty in mass production.
Please email if you know of any.
Dan