Loving Mother Earth

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Happy Earth Day!

What is a holiday, anniversary, or rememberance day? Mother's Day isn't the only day that we should dedicate honor and respect for mothers, our Birthday isn't the only day we should celebrate being alive, and certainly, Earth Day isn't the only day we should bring our attention to environmental sustainability!

Earth Day is an opportuity to help us spread the word and bring awareness to those who haven't experienced the integrity of living in harmony with our home.

Gnosis Chocolate is more Earth-friendly than you can fathom - infact once we got boxes that were TOO eco-friendly - the glue was so non-toxic that it didn't stick and we had to manually reglue every single box by hand!!! We believe that it's SO important to first reuse as much as possible before you recycle - since recycling takes a lot of energy. Look for POST CONSUMER RECYCLED material. This can be used for food packaging as long as you have an additional barrier - don't be fooled! When you see "Made with Recyclable Material" - know that this company could have used Recycled or Post Consumer Recycled material and that it's up to us to ask them to raise their integrity :)

1. Our boxes are 100% recycled, 77% post-consumer recycled, and FSC certified.
2. Our chocolate bags are biodegradable - our trailmix bags are 100% home compostable!
3. The bottom of our boxes is printed with Vegetable - not Soy! - inks
4. Our labels are certified as compostable in key biodegradation environments and are FSC certified (more on this below). They are made by NatureFlex
5. All packaging materials are reused or come from USPS. Whenever we receive shipments, we reuse the boxes and padding they came with. We never buy boxes. (reusing is better than recycling!)
6. Team Gnosis walks all orders to the Post Office instead of having an extra truck come to us.
7. Gnosis Team mates walk, bike, or take public transportation to the kitchen.
8. During the summer, we never use styrofoam! We us reusable ice packs :)
9. All paper used in printing orders, or any other important chocolate-y documents is 100% recycled.
10. We use label-backing paper as shipping padding rather than trashing it and buying packing peanuts

So what is this FSC certification from point #3? FSC stands for Forest Stewardship Council. Because our chocolate boxes are FSC certified, you can rest assure that the materials used to make them were from a well-managed forest. From their website: "FSC has developed a set of Principles and Criteria for forest management that are applicable to all FSC-certified forests throughout the world. There are 10 Principles and 57 Criteria that address legal issues, indigenous rights, labor rights, multiple benefits, and environmental impacts surrounding forest management."

We believe that our practices not only affect the planet directly, but we strive to raise the bar (yes, pun intended) for other small companies like us. Sure, it's more expensive in the short run to purchase the more environmentally sustainable option. But by voting with our dollars, we are literally shifting the marketplace to make these items become not only more affordable but  available in greater variety. Possibilities are endless when we decide to stand up and vote.