One commenter in the last post mentioned that they were uncomfortable purchasing items that are individually wrapped in plastic.  We agree, the plastic wrap has got to go.  So here’s a list of companies that are doing their part in getting rid of the wrap.

Companies that send items unwrapped in bulk

• bgreen – our most eco company in terms of packing and shipping.  They do all their manufacturing in Los Angeles about 8 miles from our warehouse.  Most of the time we don’t even have their items shipped; we schedule a time when someone’s already out and about and have the products picked up directly.  So there’s virtually no transportation cost from them to us and everything is unwrapped.  Their smaller items, like panties, don’t even have hang tags.
• Perfectly Imperfect Tees (PI Organics) – another Southern California based company that ships all their products without bags.  Sure, their dresses wind up a bit wrinkled from them to us to you, but what’s a little steamer or touch of ironing between friends?  Their lingerie also comes without hang tags.
• SOS From Texas – from seed to shirt this company works completely in the USA, and ships all their products bag-free in bulk
• Jim Morris T-Shirts – their environmental-themed screen printed tees always come in bulk without hang tags or bags. They source the tees from a variety of places from the USA to India, so there are some transportation costs, and they use conventional screen printing methods.  But the lack of packaging and a commitment to charitable giving make this small company a good choice.
• Pants to Poverty – this UK-based poverty-fighting powerhouse company has traditionally sent their panties in bulk with no tags. Their most recent line of Angel Wing and Angel Print panties came in adorable recycled cotton gift boxes for the holidays. While we love the look of the boxes, they’re environmentally impractical.  We’ve talked to them and they assure us they’ll be going back to bulk shipped items in the new year.

Companies improving packaging options

• Goddess Gear – this small, woman-owned business does all their manufacturing in Colorado and ships whole size runs in a single bag.  So all smalls for example will come in one plastic bag. Generally that will mean 2 -5 items per bag instead of individually wrapped.
• Earth Creations – this USA manufacturer has just announced that starting in 2010 they will also be doing a complete switch to corn-based bags. All of their current products are still in plastic, but we’re excited that they’re making the switch.

We take bulk-shipped items and wrap them in a single piece of 100% post-consumer recycled tissue paper before we ship them.  All bulk items go in one tissue together.  This keeps them clean and hygienic for shipping.  But if you really don’t want even that much packaging, just let us know in the comments section of your order and we’ll let all your items roam free in their shipping envelops. 🙂

On a side note, our commenter mentioned that it might be better to just buy from a local, non-organic store to avoid the packaging. I have personally seen items shipped from China in individual plastic bags get taken out of their bags and hung on hangers (from the days of college side jobs). Just because you see something on a hangar doesn’t mean it didn’t come in a plastic bag.

I’ll address shipping options (boxes versus tyvek versus reused/recycled bags) in the next post.

There is a lot of worry about credit card theft after hearing news this week of the 3 men who stole roughly 125 million credit card numbers. You may be thinking that doing business with a small company online is more risky than a big-box e-tailer like Amazon.com. Actually, at FaeriesDance.com it’s exactly the opposite!

First, let’s clarify risk. There are 2 main risks to your credit card information when shopping online. The first is that your card number is at risk during the time that it is in transit from the online store to the approving credit card bank. Transit times are generally less than 1 second total. FaeriesDance.com, like most online businesses, employees Secure Socket Layer (SSL) encryption. We use a 256-bit industry-standard encryption that encodes your credit card number while it is transmitted from our site to the credit card approving bank. This is the same level of transmission encryption that most financial institutions use. The thing is, it’s really not worth it for a potential credit card thief to try to time their hack for that partial second and then spend weeks or months breaking the encryption code to get a single credit card number. While it makes good sense to encrypt the data, credit card data is rarely if ever lost this way.

The second risk is that a potential credit card thief will hack into an online store’s encrypted database to gain access to the credit card information of every person that store has ever done business with! Not only is this a big gain for the thief, but the databases exist permanently, so they have plenty of time to crack the encryption. This is the primary way that credit cards are compromised – and it happens to companies of all sizes.

In my infinite wisdom 😉 I realized when creating FaeriesDance.com that we would not likely have the resources to keep up with the constant barrage of database threats. So, we simply avoided them altogether. FaeriesDance.com does not store your credit card information anywhere, any time, in any database, EVER!

OK, so this means that if you accidentally put in the wrong expiration date and get a message back from the bank to that effect, you have to retype the card number. If you shop with us a lot, you don’t have the neat-o feature that allows you to just reuse the same card as last time – you have to retype the card number. If you type the card number and then decide to purchase something else, as soon as you click off the payment page to go back to the shopping cart, you wipe out the card number and again, have to retype it.

While all of this retyping can occasionally be annoying, the fact is, that it is by far the most secure system of obtaining credit card information online. You type it in, it’s instantly sent to the credit card approving company and never written to any database where it could be hacked. Your credit card information does not exist on our website, and therefore cannot be stolen from our website.

For those of you who are still concerned about using your credit card online, the best piece of advice I can give is to always check the “no” option when asked if you want your credit card number saved for future purchases. (We don’t ask – saving your credit card number is not an option at FaeriesDance.com.) This simple tip will go a long way in securing your card information when shopping online.