Every jar of Honestly Mānuka comes from a beekeeper we know personally. We don't buy through brokers and we don't blend drums from different places to hit a number. Each batch comes from one keeper, one place and that's how we plan to keep it.
The label says "direct from New Zealand beekeepers", which is easy to write and harder to live up to, so we thought we'd explain what it involves.
Real people, real hives
Mānuka isn't an easy honey to make. The bush only flowers for a few weeks each summer and it tends to grow in rough country a long way from a road. Getting hives out there at the right moment, then getting them back with the honey intact, takes the sort of knowledge that isn't written down anywhere. Most of the beekeepers we buy from picked it up from their parents.
The problem with the way a lot of honey is sold is that it changes hands four or five times before it reaches a shelf and the beekeeper at the start of that chain tends to have the least say over what they're paid. We didn't want to build a brand on that, so we buy straight from the keeper instead. Nothing is blended and every batch can be traced back to the hives it came from. If you look on the jar you'll see where it was harvested and when.
What fair means to us
Plenty of labels say "ethically sourced" or "fair pay" without ever saying what that means in practice, so here's what it means for us.
Bulk Mānuka prices rise and fall with the seasons and the wider market. In a bad year a beekeeper can end up selling twelve months of work for less than it cost them to produce. To take that risk off them, we agree a minimum price with every keeper we work with and we don't go below it, whatever the market happens to be doing. A poor year for honey prices shouldn't turn into a poor year for the person who made the honey.
We also stick with the same keepers year on year rather than shopping around for the cheapest drum each season. Partly that's because the honey is better when the relationship is and partly because a minimum price only counts for something if the person on the other end knows you'll still be there next harvest.
Why we're telling you this
We called the brand Honestly, so it would be a bit hollow if it stopped at the name. When you buy a jar from us, you're paying for honey that can be traced to the hive and for the knowledge that the beekeeper behind it was paid properly for it. If you'd like to know where yours came from, ask us and we'll tell you.
