Notice to the Valued Customers of Flax Mill Textiles and to the Visitors of St. George’s Market in Belfast
Upperlands Coffee Company, hand roasters and blenders of what’s bound to be the finest coffee on these shores, are changing the packaging of their beans and ground coffee.
From now on they are using bags made of pure Irish Linen. Most of the linen has been woven by W. Clark & Sons, the oldest linen-making firm in Ireland and based in the very same village of Upperlands where the coffee is roasted.
Some of the linen was made by Flax Mill Textiles, Derrylane, Dungiven, where all the material is being finished and sewn into bags. This move by the Upperlands Coffee Company, which has obviously increased the price of their package substantially from the previously-used cotton bags, is setting a shining example of
-Saving energy for haulage and transport, one of the biggest dangers to our planet’s environment!
The old bags were shipped in from India. The new ones, raw material
included, have never left County L’derry. They had to “Travel” just
sixteen miles from Upperlands to Derrylane. The first batch was
delivered by public transport; our weaver took them in a rucksack on the bus.
-Helping to reduce poverty wages and horrific working conditions common in the world-wide textile industry.
-Creating awareness and practically helping to maintain the
endangered linen manufacturing in the North of Ireland.
-Giving their customers an even better and ecologically valuable product.
To honour this effort and further add to the lovely ambience of the
Upperlands coffee bags, Flax Mill Textiles is making them in the most
energy-saving and stylish way possible:
-We have re-activated a pedal sewing machine made in the 1890’s for
all the sewing.
-The linen is unbleached (no chemicals). We wash it with pure soap
made in Fermanagh.