Bishopston Trading, based in Bristol, has been a supplier of excellent Fair Trade clothing for many years but I see that it is now closing down. In part this is due to a reduction in orders as Britain has been in a period of austerity and people are either buying cheaper clothes or making them last longer. More signficantly, they now have a shortage of weavers in the village community they were dealing with; parents have been able to afford to educate their children and those children have chosen to pursue education and dreams that take them beyond the village and the craft of weaving.

In some ways, this is a sad ending but tinged with happiness. If the owners feel that they want to do something other than seek out new villages to support and new customers to buy, then good wishes to them. I am not a regular customer (I have been in the “make your clothes last” camp long before the current financial downturn) and it means I will have to look elsewhere for the kind of styles they had available but there are plenty of other choices and this seems a good ending for all concerned.