Las Vegas Market Names Global Goodness Award Winners
Four exhibitors at the 2017 Winter Las Vegas Market – Anji Mountain, The Cottage Potters, Dunitz & Company and Quilling Card – are winners of its sixth Global Goodness Awards, recognizing furniture, home decor and gift companies for environmentally-friendly, sustainable and socially responsible activities. The 2017 Global Goodness Awards were presented at the Winter Market.
“Las Vegas Market is pleased to recognize companies whose production and business practices are making positive impacts not only on the industry, but also to communities around the world in the course of sourcing and manufacturing their products,” said Dorothy Belshaw, President of Gift Leasing and Chief Marketing Officer, International Market Centers. “As the leading furniture, home decor and gift destination in the western United States, Las Vegas Market is proud to support these corporate “good citizens” who are dedicated to are doing well by doing good.”
A panel of industry sustainability and social responsibility experts – Colvin English of ByHand Consulting, Susan Inglis of the Sustainable Furnishings Council and Carol MacNulty of Aid to Artisans – reviewed a record number of entries and selected one winner from each of the Market’s core industries: gift (Dunitz & Company), home décor (The Cottage Potters) and furniture (Anji Mountain). A fourth “People’s Choice” winner (Quilling Card), was determined by popular voting on the Las Vegas Market Facebook page.
Dunitz & Company, a two-time winner of the Global Goodness Award, is known for providing beautiful beaded and fused glass jewelry handcrafted by more than 100 women and men in Guatemala. Company founder Nancy Dunitz visited Guatemala for the first time in 1989, and dedicated herself to working with local artisans to develop designs that would appeal to the U.S. market. Dunitz & Company is a member of the Fair Trade Federation, a Gold Business Certified member of Green America and a founding member of Fair Trade Los Angeles.
Home décor winner, The Cottage Potters, produces and designs high-quality wheel-thrown clay fired with wood. Its Mexico-based workforce of designers, potters, and artisans who apply colors, are considered as individuals, and the company credo involves respecting their dignity, recognizing their merit and providing each with an opportunity to make a fair profit. The company also has responsibilities to the communities where we live and work, and has adopted a program to assist women in distress.
Furniture winner Anji Mountain’s mission is to innovate within the floor covering space by using genuinely sustainable and recycled materials. The company has partnered with Trees for the Future to plant one tree in a needy East of West African community for each rug that the company sells. This sense of duty and urgency to address the powerful man-made pressures on our fragile environment are creating a powerful positive impact for the people living in these vulnerable communities.
People’s Choice award winner Quilling Card is known for producing exquisite handmade greeting cards crafted by artisans in Vietnam using the centuries-old art of quilling, which involves rolling, coiling, shaping and gluing paper to create a unified, decorative design. Founded in 2012 and based in Framingham, Massachusetts, Quilling Card is certified by the Fair Trade Federation and currently employs more than 300 quillers in Vietnam, primarily women who are provided with safe working environments, sustainable wages approximately 20 to 25 percent above the national average, and health care.
The Global Goodness awards program supplements an ongoing partnership Las Vegas Market has with the Sustainable Furnishings Council (SFC) to create One Good World, a guide to sustainable furniture and home décor products to help connect legitimate suppliers and retailers in this new era of sustainability and accountability. The effort includes a sustainable products locator program, showcasing relevant at-Market resources, expanded educational offerings addressing issues and opportunities connected with sustainability.
