It's always intriguing how a seemingly simple chain of events can have an impact in life. Founder, Wendy Farmerie, started out as an international buyer in the big business side of things. As she visited factories overseas and built friendships with her suppliers, she found their work situations unsettling and conditions completely haunting. She realized it wasn't just a job to be done, there was a human impact to her actions. In 2006, she made the decision to be part of the solution, not part of the problem, and walked away from her career to open a fair trade retail store. In contrast to buying practices in big business, fair trade is about the people, not the profit. It's about paying artisans fairly, making sure their working conditions are safe with access to things like healthcare, job training, and education for their children. It's about giving them a hand up to self sufficiency, not a hand out. Here we are, 15 years later. We've developed amazing relationships with our artisan groups, but there are thousands of artisans in the world needing that hand up. The Eclectic Woodchuck was founded to do just that. Our products are hand crafted...made by people, not automated machines. We focus on paper and wood items, with a delightful dash of our favorites from our artisan groups thrown in. You'll find things like batik wall art from Nepal, glass jewelry from Chile, and fabric wallets from Turkey. We know our name is a little quirky, but so are we so it's a perfect fit.