While many American consumers are looking to save wherever they can, there are also quite a few who are willing to pay a little more for fair trade products.
According to Fair Trade USA, mainstream grocery stores saw the biggest increase of all retail channels in fair trade product sales during 2010.
"We are encouraged by the fact that in spite of the economic recession, consumers everywhere are embracing the idea that every purchase matters," said Cate Baril, director of business development, grocery and ingredients, at Fair Trade USA. "We continue to see strong, double digit growth in the natural and specialty channels. And we see even stronger growth in supermarkets where sales are up 26 percent, as more stores are adding a greater variety of fair trade certified products and increasing selection for consumers."
Coffee is the largest fair trade food category. Sales for coffee were up 33 percent last year. Ready to drink tea and coffee sales jumped 39 percent.
Other categories achieving sales increases included chocolate (19 percent), sweeteners (17 percent) and frozen desserts (four percent).
Fair trade health and beauty products also gained, with skin/body care up 32 percent. Aromatherapy and body oils were up 19 percent.
Stacy Geagan Wagner, director of communications for Fair Trade USA, said fair trade products are now found in stores ranging from Walmart to single-store independents.
"It's [fair trade] still such a small percentage of the market that there's room for everyone to grow," Ms. Wagner told Business News Daily.