Welcome to RareOrchid.London.
I would like to introduce myself to you and explain why I have started this revolutionary enterprise.
About Me
Through my own research, I found large, corporate aggressive marketing can easily over shadow the smaller, more ethical chocolate sellers and my own passion developed to begin Rare Orchid.London.
From the skills I have accrued through the course of my career, I set up this project which could support some of the poorest cocoa producing communities and support small and medium companies who want to make a better living selling their chocolates through on line retail.
Rare Orchid.London has been launched with the core beliefs of sustainable business practice to offer the farmers a better quality of life for their families and extended communities as well as provide our retailers better market exposure and embrace a larger costumer-base.
Since 2007, I have found my passions in supporting underrepresented communities both through my work in the Third Sector and starting new community-based projects.
For more than 15 years, I have worked in the charity sector and have supported some of London’s most vulnerable hard to reach groups. This involved my work with environmental, human rights and homeless charities.
That is where my passions lie, through offering the best opportunities to the small guys who would like to be part of a larger community.
From 2007 – 2012, I set up and ran a world class social club social enterprise for men and women who may have experienced homelessness, ill mental health, learning difficulties amongst others which may have found themselves socially excluded for reasons out of their own control.
I continued my own passions while working as a support worker in a homeless hostel and set up a small gardening charity in 2014 and pursued my own passion for the environment and helped vulnerable adults have a better quality of life through gardening workshops.
Up until now, I have been working with various homeless charities. I supported our clients to have better opportunities with their own career vocations, by helping them find suitable jobs, education and voluntary opportunities which would be able to give them better chances in life.
As Rare Orchid.London is evolves and as our brand gains traction in the sustainable chocolate sector, I hope to be part of a global initiative. To harness the skills of every aspect in the chocolate making process and find ways which can embrace sound environmental and social aspects that should afford everyone involved with bean to bar process a better and more sustainable quality of life.
Thank you for reading my story and I look forward to establishing meaningful partnerships with all our stakeholders who are as keen as I am to be a part of this new collective.
Welcome to a whole new movement as part of a larger environmental and social collective.
Mark Banham
Director, Rare Orchid.London