Abel & Cole organic box 2021

The best organic veg box delivery?

For organic food online, Friends of the Earth suggests Abel & Cole boxes. You get great food. Bees are safe from pesticides. And we receive donations.
  Published:  17 May 2018    |      3 minute read

Eat fresh, tasty food while looking out for our bees.

Ordering an organic veg box helps keep our pollinators safe from chemicals. It also invites less plastic waste into your home, cutting your contribution to all that plastic pollution lingering in our oceans and soils.

On top of all that goodness, when you sign up for a food box from Abel & Cole, we receive a £20 donation. Raising funds for Friends of the Earth helps us continue to protect the things you care about like nature, wildlife and people's health.

We've got this in the bag – or in this case, the box.

Essential organic vegetable box from Abel & Cole with lettuce, cabbage, onions, beets, tomatoes and greens.
Credit: Jessica Spengler

The benefits of veg boxes

An organic veg box is good for bees

When EU countries and the UK voted to ban three bee-harming pesticides, it was a massive victory for bees. Together we made the government listen. But too much of our countryside is still being contaminated by pesticides. 

Another way we can help save bees is to help farmers reduce their overall use of pesticides. Ordering an organic veg box is the perfect way to do this. The bees will thank you for it by continuing to pollinate almost all our food crops.

Organic farmers also plant wildflowers, which bees absolutely adore. Instead of using chemicals, which indiscriminately harm insect life, they rely on predator insects and birds to keep their crops safe, just like nature intended.

Bumblebee on clover
Bumblebee on clover
Credit: Alan Palmer

Veg box deliveries are good for people

Abel & Cole boxes make the most of the seasons. You won't receive travel-sick tomatoes in the middle of winter or plastic-suffocated apples in June.

Eating seasonally ensures that you're getting a varied diet – which means it's more likely that you're giving your body all the goodness it needs to do its thing. And, as an added bonus, you're supporting local farmers, which in turn helps your local economy to thrive. 

But most importantly, seasonal food tastes much yummier anyway (in our opinion).

Shrinks your carbon footprint

How many times do you drive to the supermarket or grocery store each month? Kudos if you walk, cycle or get public transport, by the way.

The truth is though that most of the trips we make in the UK are by car – 62% of all journeys. Wouldn't it be great if you could lower your fuel bill while getting deliciously fresh, local veg brought to your door? Well you can with a good food box scheme.

Abel & Cole drivers each deliver up to 100 organic food boxes in one day. When you think about it, that could save 100 separate car journeys to the supermarket. And what about the savings in food air miles? Abel & Cole sources scrumptious fruit, veggies and a lot of other organic produce from local farms – meaning they're not being flown half way around the world in a plane spewing out nasty climate-change emissions.

Kind to the soil

Supermarkets demand lots of food at low prices. They may also place aesthetic demands on farmers, resulting in perfectly-fine-to-eat, but wonky or blemished, fruit and veg going to waste.

These pressures can result in the land being intensively farmed – meaning that it's constantly being worked, without a moment's rest to rejuvenate, and doused in chemical pesticides and fertilisers.

Organic farming uses nitrogen-fixing crops and manures to fertilise the land instead of a lorry-load of chemicals. Crops are rotated to give the soil a rest and keep it nice and healthy. After all, generations to come depend on us looking after that land and not blowing it for profit.

Two hands holding soil with small plant roots
Credit: Pxhere.com

Organic veg box schemes

Friends of the Earth is right behind Abel & Cole's drive to empower local organic farming. In return they're supporting our work to protect people and planet.

For every new customer that signs up to a weekly Abel & Cole organic food box, we'll:

  • Receive £20 on their first delivery.
  • Get an extra £5 on the third delivery.
  • And a subsequent £10 on the fifth delivery.

Sign me up

Firstly, if you want to sign up, a big thank you from Friends of the Earth, Abel & Cole and the bees. Here's how you do it:

  1. Hop across to abelandcole.co.uk/signup
  2. Choose the box that’s right for you
  3. Enter the code "FRIENDS" at the checkout.

You can search for local organic veg box schemes on the Soil Association website too.