When we started, way back in 2002, nobody in the UK had heard of jute bags – and cotton bags were only for Germans and hippies. Believe it or not, it was actually OK to accumulate and throw out vast piles of plastic bags. We begged to differ: our first statement of principle.
At first, explaining why businesses should switch to natural, reusable bags wasn’t easy. Then Ireland slapped a tax on plastic bags, sailors discovered the Great Pacific Garbage Patch and Modbury became the world’s first plastic bag free town. Slowly, people began to understand what we had been saying for years.
As the UK’s first dedicated supplier of environmentally-friendly natural bags, we have always held a set of core values based around honesty and respect. Our steady purpose is to do what we can to make a better world, while keeping our customers and our partners happy.
Find out more about our guiding principles
Our goods are made in Kolkata, India, a place with a very different culture to our own.
In this huge city, sweatshops, domestic piecework, child labour and simple dishonesty are rife. Over the last nine years we have seen this with our own eyes in many factories supplying our competitors.
Many bag importers switch from supplier to supplier in search of the cheapest deal. We work with one dedicated manufacturing partner whose ethical principles are in tune with ours.
We have always conducted our own inspections, supplementing them with regular independent audits to ensure compliance with SEDEX ETI and BSCI.
Find out more about our ethical trade policy
Our aim is to supply the best bags – not the cheapest. Working closely with our partners in India and the UK, we strive to ensure that every bag reaches you in perfect condition.
We buy our materials carefully. We have special ways to print them. Our dyes are bright, fast and true. We make and finish our bags with care, and exercise vigorous checks before despatching them. Our manufacturing partners are ISO9001 certified.
The result: better-looking, high-performance products that reflect well on your brand. They even fetch a higher price at retail. Canby bags may cost a few pennies more than some of our rivals, but our customers tell us it’s worth it.
Our strict quality standards
Our nine years of experience have taught us one thing: if we don’t keep our customers happy, then we don’t feel happy ourselves.
We will always be honest with you. We never make a promise we can’t keep. We strive to get things right, and if something goes wrong we pull out all the stops to fix it.
There’s no magic formula to customer service, but we do know that on-time delivery and spot-on manufacturing really matter.
Read our genuine customer testimonials
Our mission is to provide a sustainable, reusable alternative to single-use disposable bags. It’s only natural that we should seek to minimise our own environmental impact.
We’re all too aware that the manufacture and transportation of Canby bag involves the emission of greenhouse gases, such as carbon dioxide, that contribute to global warming. We offset all our carbon emissions with Equiclimate.
Find out more about our environmental policy