Following the Scottish Government’s announcement yesterday that Renfrewshire can exit level 4 restrictions, we will be reopening Rainbow Turtle at 10am on Saturday 12th December!
To allow our lovely customers as much Christmas shopping time as possible, we have extended our opening hours from the 12th until we close on Christmas Eve.
We look forward to seeing you back in the shop!
With lots more time being spent at home, many of us have turned to online learning as a way to not only fill time and entertain us, but also broaden our horizons when the world can feel so small. Our Education Officer, Gemma, has been trying out some Fair Trade focused courses and recommends the Who Made My Clothes? course, run by Fashion Revolution and the University of Exeter on Future Learn.
The course runs over three weeks, with learning and exercises to be done in your own time, and is broken down into sections dedicated to being curious, finding out, and doing something. Fashion Revolution and their Who Made My Clothes? campaign came about following the Rana Plaza tragedy, in which over 1000 garment workers lost their lives. They fight for better conditions for fashion workers, a goal which is shared across the Fair Trade movement.
This course is very accessible, providing plenty of useful information with videos and reading, but with more of a focus on taking action (as a consumer and Fair Trade supporter) than some other courses which can be quite information heavy and theoretical.
Fashion Revolution ask you to ask retailers “who made my clothes?” and, as this course shows, often there are no simple answers and no guarantee of workers’ rights. This is an action that we can apply outside of the fashion industry – ask your local supermarket “who grew my coffee?” or “who picked my bananas?” and you might be surprised at their answers.
The pupils of Mary Russell School have been hard at work repainting our lion in readiness for displaying him in our Christmas window. We’re hoping to have him on display when we reopen our shop on Saturday 12th December.
His decor may not be the only thing that will have changed about him, he may also have a new name…! Any ideas what it could be?
We were delighted that the Paisley Daily Express wrote up this lovely article about Mary Russell winning the prestigious fair trade award at the annual Scottish Fair Trade Forum’s award ceremony. We’d also like to thank them for kindly giving us permission to share it.
Black Friday, a day known for excessive consumerism and waste, approaches and while we can’t suggest shopping ethically with us instead right now – as we’re sadly closed under Level 4 Coronavirus restrictions – we’ll be supporting Traidcraft’s annual Reject Black Friday campaign.
We believe in doing our best to live in ways that support the environment and people, rejecting mass-consumerism that often relies on taking advantage of workers and contributing to environmental disaster.
Think about where you shop this Christmas, and consider whether you can wait a few weeks to get something ethically sound, rather than opting for mindless speed and volume.
As today is the final shopping day with us before our 3 week lockdown hiatus, we’ll be staying open until 6pm!
We have stock remaining of The Real Advent Calendar and Divine’s dark chocolate calendar which is vegan society certified – get them while you still can!
Following the Scottish Government’s announcement that Renfrewshire will be moving into level 4, the Rainbow Turtle shop will be closing for 3 weeks at 4pm on Friday.
So you’ve got three days to get shopping! We recommend stocking up on all of your household essentials, like refills and toilet roll, as well as treating family and friends to some of our Christmas goodies!
We’ll be open from 10am until 4pm today, tomorrow, and Friday.
Following the announcement today from the Scottish Government that Renfrewshire will be moving into level 4 restrictions, Rainbow Turtle will be closed from 4pm on Friday 20th November until 10am on Saturday 12th December.
At this time, we won’t be able to offer any click & collect or delivery services. We’ll still be open on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday this week, from 10am until 4pm, and we hope you might take this chance to buy Christmas essentials (advent calendars, cards, gifts!) early.
We’ll see you in December!
Tonight, pupils at Mary Russell Secondary, and their teachers, were awarded the 2020 Scottish Fair Trade Campaign Award by the Scottish Fair Trade Forum for the work they’ve done with us at Rainbow Turtle and in their community to spread the word of Fair Trade and sustainability. Well done Mary Russell!
The video below shows just some of what they’ve done so far, and you can get a sneak peak at their next project with Rainbow Turtle here!
The pupils of Mary Russell school, under the guidance of their art teacher, Miss Ferguson, have started smartening up Rio the lion. Our hope is that they will have him ready for the beginning of December for our new Christmas window.
What do think of his new rainbow mane? We enclose a picture of how he looked when he came to us to compare with how he is starting to shape up.
Please keep supporting Rainbow Turtle. We hope to keep trading, even if we have to shut the shop during lockdown, by restarting our click and collect service. Click here for more information about our click and collect service.
