El Quetzal was formed in June of 1997 and received its non-profit status in 1999. The primary mission of this non-profit corporation is to provide a non-exploitative income and support services to Guatemalan artisans who have little or no access to resources and capital.

After twelve years of working with artist cooperatives in Guatemala, El Quetzal remains committed to Fair Trade practices. There are many good reasons to re-focus on developing fair trade models in this largely one-sided trading world. Direct communication with the artisan producers and their elected leaderships always informs El Quetzal’s priorities. In every meeting, every letter signed by group members and governing councils, the final and most heartfelt request is for more work with fair pay, more income to buy school supplies, to buy medicines, to buy clothes, to eat. Non-exploitative income options are scarce throughout the country.

Demands for land from campesinos who lost their titles in the 36-year civil war, or never held titles, continue to fall on deaf ears. Income from the sale of extra corn, the population’s basic food crop, has disappeared due to the flood of cheap, subsidized corn from U.S. corporate farms since the 2005 passage of CAFTA. Fallen prices of cash crops like coffee, cardamom, sugar and bananas have made many farmers and farm employees desperate. When poorly paid garment workers at a Phillips Van Heusen clothing assembly plant in Guatemala finally won the right to unionize to improve their working conditions in 1998, the company shut down the factory within two months and moved to Honduras. With the privatization of all basic utilities and communications, living costs have increased steadily.

Despite the odds, El Quetzal and the artists continue to work together to promote sustainable growth within the artisans’ communities. El Quetzal supports this effort by not only paying its partner producers fairly, but also by providing them with valuable services not available in regular buyer/seller relationships. For example. El Quetzal always pays a one third down payment or anticipo to all producers when we leave new orders. This allows the producers to buy thread, beads and other raw materials in bulk, thus at reduced cost to each artisan. In addition, we do not demand exclusivity on the designs we introduce and are happy for producers to share them with other clients, and we are happy to share our producer information with customers.

A distinguishing factor about El Quetzal is that every year El Quetzal reinvests a percentage of its profits to the cooperatives with which we work. Cooperative members decide how to use the investment. For example, past investments have included the purchase of looms, sewing machine repairs, craft workshops for the cooperative members and literacy classes.

El Quetzal chooses to work directly with the artisan producers in Guatemala whenever possible. Although we have in the past ordered from fair trade distributors up North to supplement our product line, we have found that with direct relationships we learn and grow much more on each end of the partnership.

We applaud and support the efforts of related network activists like the national Fair Trade Federation, now partnered with Coop America. El Quetzal has been a full member since 1999. We also support the work of national and local organizations promoting U.S. policy change towards Guatemala and human rights in Guatemala, such as the San Francisco-based Network in Solidarity with the People of Guatemala (NISGUA). All of these functions are essential to promote a world future other than one dominated by the quarterly profit reports of international corporations, and El Quetzal’s piece of the pie involves a different and less one-sided model of conducting trade and business between consumers and producers.

El Quetzal has traditionally had two successful annual “seasons” of sales: a summer festival season which is kicked off the last weekend in May with our booth at the Northwest Folklife Festival, and the Christmas season highlighted by six or seven alternative holiday sales hosted by Seattle and Tacoma churches. In 2008, El Quetzal opened a wholesale branch of the organization, selling to retail stores throughout the Northwest. The Board has known for quite some time that steady sales throughout the year are needed to provide producer groups with dependable income.

We appreciate your support and collaboration in working towards a brighter future for all of us. Both consumers and producers benefit when the relationship between them is respectful, mutually beneficial and empowering.

The Board of Directors of El Quetzal