Sourcing Story: Super Lotus

At fresh, we have always been about nourishing your skin with natural ingredients of the highest quality. However, another crucial aspect of the brand is finding a way to give back – to nourish the skin of the earth. For our indulgent Lotus Skincare Collection, we settled on a farm in Alabama, USA. We turned to Ten Mile Creek Farm to source the youth-preserving lotus plant that creates our Super Lotus ingredient. In doing so, we protect the biodiversity and ensure the unique people of the community thrive.

We became a Union for Ethical BioTrade (UEBT) member in 2020 to better understand and improve how we source and work with ingredient suppliers. It’s an evolving partnership aligned with what we were trying to achieve. We made changes over the years, and our Super Lotus ingredient reached UEBT verified ethically sourced* level in 2023.

Let’s talk about fresh’s initial obsession with the lotus plant and look at the steps we took together to improve sourcing practices and our relationship with Laura Bancroft, who runs the Ten Mile Creek Farm.

A natural preservation of beauty

The seeds of the lotus plant go back over 138 million years and have been used in various ways for centuries. Our co-founder, Lev Glazman, was fascinated by the journey of the lotus – it must rise through murky waters to the surface, where it blossoms into a gorgeous flower. He wanted to tap into the plant’s ability to preserve its beauty on its journey through the depths and apply it to the skin. Our search for the right supplier of the sacred plant led us to Ten Mile Creek Farm, the largest lotus farm in the United States.

Ten Mile Farm is a unique multi-generational agricultural enterprise started by the Kennedy-Bancroft family in South Alabama in the early 1900s. It was named after the creek that runs through the farm, which hasn’t run dry for over 100 years. The farm has evolved over the last century from growing peanuts, cotton, and corn to pine trees and fish such as catfish and tilapia. However, competing overseas businesses made fish production nearly impossible, and the ponds on the farm were left empty. That’s when a fresh ingredient supplier approached them about producing lotus for one of their sourcing projects.

Fast forward to today, and Ten Mile Creek Farm is the largest lotus-only producer in the United States. Laura Bancroft says, “We sell over 400 cultivars of ornamental lotus rhizomes via the Internet, both wholesale and retail. Our partnership means that our lotus is featured in some of the most respected brands in the world.”

From farm to face

We love the sacred lotus for our fresh products. It’s a type of lotus with big, gorgeous flowers that are usually white and pink. The lotus plants (Nelumbo nucifera) are handpicked from the water between mid-July and August while in full bloom. The Super Lotus extract found in our AHA serum, daily moisturizer, eye cream, face mask, and dream cream is extracted from the whole living lotus plant, not just the flower. We capture the plant’s unique molecules to help preserve skin youthfulness, which means smoother texture, a radiant glow, and resilience to life’s daily stressors.

A scientist works at an on-site mobile lab to ensure that the active molecules are still intact after the plant has been harvested. Once they’ve determined this, the whole plant is gently pressed to obtain the plant’s juice. All within an hour of being handpicked. Off-site, an innovative youth-fractioning technique isolates the plant cell fraction to create a powerful concentrated ingredient. Any by-products from the plant are returned to the soil to help nurture and maintain the ecological balance.

Sustainability standards

We love that family is at the heart of Ten Mile Creek Farm, and Bancroft firmly recalls her grandfather’s farming philosophy from when she was a child: “It was our duty to protect the land so that it would produce what we needed to survive and grow – then and in the future.” This resonates with us on an integral level, and they are the same standard to which fresh holds itself accountable today. We’re on a mission to advance and improve our sourcing practices and relationships so that we can help biodiversity and people thrive.

Biodiversity includes every living thing that contributes to our natural environment, such as plants, animals, fungi, and microorganisms. Each of these plays a part in our complex ecosystems and works seamlessly together to support life and maintain balance in the natural world. As a member of the Union for Ethical BioTrade (UEBT), we are invested in finding even more sustainable ways to select and source our ingredients. We strive to nurture the relationships we have with suppliers to elevate the brand and industry to new standards. We inspire each other to do better for the environment and the communities that rely on it.

“UEBT standards provide a framework… so that you’re not just hitting it once in a while,” explains Bancroft. “With the framework, it gives [you] something to work for, to work towards, and to gauge your success.”

The framework involves regular on-site assessment against the strict UEBT standards. UEBT has seven principles – biodiversity conservation, sustainable use of biodiversity, systems for ethical sourcing, legal compliance, respect for worker rights, clarity about land tenure, right of use and access to natural resources, and fair and equitable benefit sharing – on which the verification process is based. The aim, as a brand, is to show progress toward sourcing with regard to people and biodiversity.

Ethically sourced*

Our process is continually growing and evolving. Since 2020, we haven’t stopped in our quest to find ways to improve our practices. During harvest season in July 2023, the sourcing of our Super Lotus ingredient underwent a thorough assessment by UEBT, using their full field checklist of more than 100 criteria and verified to be ethically sourced* level.

We achieved the highest level in UEBT onsite verification. This means that our sourcing practices for our Super Lotus (used in our Lotus Skincare Collection) promote a positive impact on people and biodiversity. What did we do to our sourcing process to create a positive impact? On top of having a transparent supply chain and organic agricultural practices, we improved in the following three key areas:

Water analysis

Ten Mile Creek Farm is home to a wonderfully diverse ecosystem and we needed to implement a water monitoring system to ensure it was safe and viable for all life in the area, such as the relatively rare gopher tortoise. In partnership with the farm, we ensure that the ponds and waterways are free from toxic substances or residue, as well as biological components, to prevent cross-contamination when the water is drained back into the local wetlands area.

Renewable energy

Energy consumption on the farm has always been tracked, but under recommendation from UEBT, we adopted new measures to optimize energy efficiency and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Draining the ponds for the harvest was a particularly energy-intensive process and so we used the hot Alabama sun to assist by installing two new solar-powered pumps. “Today, crystal clear water flows into the lotus ponds via renewable energy, removing us from the standard energy grid,” says Bancroft.

Workers’ contracts

We care for the community, and this means taking care of its people. Alabama is an “at will” state, so it's rare for agricultural workers to receive a written standard job contract. This was something that we wanted to change. So, in 2023, Ten Mile Creek Farm’s full-time employees received written contracts. This is a step in the right direction when it comes to protecting human rights, especially for vulnerable community groups. The onsite UEBT assessment confirmed that the employees’ working conditions are “very good.”

At fresh, we know that the earth’s skin is just as important as our own and that we need to nourish, care, and nurture it in the same ways. This means we must work to protect and strengthen what we have. We want to ensure a world that is forever connected and forever fresh.

*UEBT verified