The name says it all: Fruit At Work delivers fruit baskets to businesses. But not just any fruit: each basket is 100% fair trade and delivered by bicycle – whenever possible. Sustainability is embedded in the company’s DNA, at every stage. Interview with owners Yannick and Youri Aerts.
Fruit At Work is a family business founded in 2008 by Youri Aerts, who brought his father’s idea to life. His father was inspired by a customer where he saw a student packing local fruit – apples, pears, cherries, etc. – which was then delivered to businesses in the neighbourhood. This prompted him to develop the idea on a larger scale. In 2015, his brother Yannick joined him. Youri (right in the photo) is responsible for day-to-day operations, while Yannick (left in the photo) focuses more on strategy.
Today, Fruit At Work delivers to more than 3,000 customers across Belgium every week from its packing facility in Sint-Truiden. These customers are very diverse, ranging from local tyre shops to large banks with branches throughout Belgium. Not to mention schools, thanks to which Fruit At Work supplies fair trade fruit to 70,000 children in Flanders.
Fairtrade XS is the smallest fruit basket in the range, enough to supply 2 to 3 people with fruit for a whole working week. For larger offices, there are standard baskets containing 5-8 to 10 kg of fruit. The contents are flexible and can be tailored to suit large companies.
Sustainability as a guiding principle
“If I had to describe Fruit At Work in one word, I would choose ‘appreciation’,” explains Yannick. ‘Appreciation of the customer, of nature, of suppliers, of everyone involved in the chain. Our slogan is ‘Honesty is delicious’. And we want to apply that to everything we do.”
Fruit At Work believes it is its responsibility to deliver a quality product to the customer. It is the company that decides how sustainable the product the customer receives is. “At no point has the market demanded that the fruit we offer be fair trade, that Belgian farmers receive a fair price, or that transport be by bicycle. We have taken all these measures because we ourselves are convinced of the importance of sustainability and we communicate this to the customer,” explains Yannick.
Since 2018, Fruit At Work’s tropical fruit has carried the Fairtrade label. A few years later, Belgian fruit was also certified by the Fair Producer label. This means that the entire basket now consists of fair trade fruit. During the same period, the family business started using bicycles as a means of transport, first in Ghent city centre, then in Antwerp, Brussels, Mechelen, Leuven and Liège. After all, how can you offer your customers a healthy product if its transport pollutes the air they breathe? So they opted for bicycles. It is certainly not the cheapest option, as they lose more than their competitors in terms of transport, but it is the most environmentally friendly. Whenever they set up in a new city, they call on bicycle couriers – the Flandriens, as they call them – and together they examine the volume that can be delivered and transported. In this way, they give them the opportunity to develop.
The importance of communication
“To convince customers of the benefits of sustainable development, you first have to make sure that the product is good: the quality, the service… and only then does the rest come into play,” explains Youri. Communication is essential in this regard. Online, offline or on the packaging. Fruit At Work was named SDG Ambassador by the United Nations in 2023, as one of the first four companies in the world, and indicates this on its packaging. That’s what makes us unique, Yannick proudly declares. ‘Everything we do in terms of sustainability is motivated by our convictions, not because the customer demands it or because the law requires it.’
“It’s still very difficult to get the message across to customers, but it’s so important. Often, people don’t even know that there is a fair and sustainable option for fruit baskets,‘ explains Youri. ’A few years ago, sustainability suddenly became a priority for businesses. CSRD legislation required companies to report on their sustainability performance, and this requirement was also extended to small businesses. Thousands of points had to be taken into account in sustainability reports. The arrival of the omnibus* somewhat mitigated this trend, and suddenly sustainability became less important.”
Nevertheless, Youri notes that more and more companies are working with them because of their identity. For example, companies are specifically looking for a fair trade product and are turning to Fruit At Work because it is the only supplier offering this type of product on the Belgian market. In this way, they discover other aspects of the story, namely that Belgian fruit is also certified or that bicycle transport is sometimes provided by people who have difficulty finding employment.
Their customers are very happy with this approach. “And that’s a good thing for us,” says Youri, “because we certainly don’t always choose the easiest path. It’s up to us to make it work, and that’s what we’ve been doing for over 17 years now, throughout Belgium.”
In collaboration with Prix Juste Producteur
Fruit At Work therefore uses certification to offer its customers the guarantee of a fair product. All fruit from the South is Fairtrade certified. For Fruit At Work, the most important thing is that farmers receive a fair price and that producers have a say in setting prices.
And they apply this policy to Belgian fruit, which comes directly from producers in Hesbaye. To do this, they work with the Prix Juste Producteur label. This label monitors the first link in the chain. ‘If you ask a producer whether they receive a fair price, they may be too quick to say “yes” for fear that their harvest will not be bought. But Prix Juste Producteur actually checks the accounts. This guarantees transparency, including towards customers,’ explains Yannick.
Prix Juste Producteur is a Walloon label that is not (yet) very well known in Flanders. Fruit At Work was previously involved in setting up “Boervriendelijk”, a Flemish initiative promoting local fair trade, but unfortunately this initiative disappeared without trace. Fruit At Work, which is currently the only Flemish company to have joined this initiative, has therefore joined forces with Prix Juste Producteur. However, Yannick hopes that a Dutch-language certification or a Flemish equivalent will one day see the light of day, as this could convince more Flemish companies and entrepreneurs involved in fair trade to join the adventure and thus increase the visibility of local fair trade in Flanders.
Checking for yourself
When it comes to sustainability guarantees, Fruit At Work does not rely solely on certification. ‘Because things can go wrong there too,’ says Youri, “and we don’t want to hide behind that. We also carry out our own checks. “
They ask their suppliers for official reports from Global Gap (for companies that supply supermarkets) and GRASP (Global Risk Assessment Social Practices – a kind of social audit for people in the workplace), or they contact the supplier directly.
If their way of working does not comply with Fruit At Work’s standards and values, they terminate the collaboration. The brothers have the final say and are not accountable to any higher authority or management seeking to maximise profits. “Either we do business sustainably, or we don’t do it at all,” says Youri. “Even if the customer is satisfied, if we are not comfortable with it, we will terminate the collaboration. This has happened in the past, even if it is to our detriment.”
Price and control: two major challenges
In order to (continue to) operate fairly, pricing is one of the main challenges. “If you act fairly, you can’t be the cheapest,” says Yannick. “We sometimes meet large companies that talk constantly about sustainability. They have enough budget to pay everyone fairly, but in the end, they still find us too expensive. But we give so much in return, I think to myself: with us, you get fruit that tastes good for the consumer and for the farmer. Everyone in the chain receives a fair price. Controlling all this takes time and energy, and of course that also has a price. Do you expect me to go to the producer and say, ‘It has to be cheaper,’ and squeeze every last drop out of them? Not because the customer can’t afford it, because these are often companies making millions in profits, but simply because they are not willing to pay the price?”
In addition, monitoring is also a major challenge. The fruit and transport sectors are sectors where abuse is commonplace, so Fruit At Work must remain vigilant to ensure that everything is done properly.
Greater ethics, not a priority
According to Yannick, public authorities have an important role to play in the future of fair trade. When certain things become mandatory, companies must comply. This has been very clear with the legislative framework relating to corporate due diligence. Companies are then responsible for the entire chain, not just the last link. As a company, you must therefore take an interest in the working conditions and the origin of raw materials for all your suppliers.
‘This allows competition on the right criteria, rather than on aspects that should not be taken into account,’ he explains. ‘We are on the right track in Europe. Things are changing, but a legislative framework can significantly speed up the process or, unfortunately, slow it down. We have seen this with certain directives that were adopted and then watered down.’
During his 10 years of experience in the sector, Yannick has seen only limited change in demand for more ethical and responsible consumption. The younger generation is certainly more open to this, but they rarely hold decision-making positions in large companies. If the CEO of a large company makes truly fair and sustainable choices, it can create a real buzz and inspire others, but in practice, this rarely happens.
He gives the example of bicycle transport. “On Mondays, Fruit At Work is the largest user of bicycle transport in Belgium, even though we are an SME!” Yannick exclaims. “If a multinational company decides tomorrow to cover the last kilometre by bicycle, it could tip the balance. So it’s really important that the leaders of large companies share our mindset. If cities, municipalities and politicians join us, then we can really talk about change.”
Yannick says that we would love to hear that things are gradually improving, but honesty compels him to say that we are not there yet and that sustainable choices are not a priority for most companies. However, he remains optimistic, because the more companies that rally to this cause, the more attractive the fair approach – including in terms of price – will become and the more it will be able to compete with the unfair approach. But for that to happen, volume is needed.
What does the future hold for Fruit At Work?
“I would like to be able to plan everything perfectly, from A to Z. That we can be 100% sure that every piece of fruit in the basket has been paid for at a fair price.” Since this year, Yannick has been sitting on the board of directors of the Belgian Fair Trade Federation in order to share his knowledge with other players in the fair trade sector.
“I hope that we can move towards a situation where customers really choose us for who we are. That fair trade simply becomes the norm. That it’s no longer even a subject of debate,” concludes Youri.
More info: www.fruitatwork.eu
Photo copyright: Tim Dirven
