Ethical Gelato

At Gelateria Gondola, it's not enough for us just to be in business selling the best gelato in Sydney. It's important to us that we're making the best gelato whilst running our business in an ethical way that we, and our customers, can be proud of.

Here are just a few of things we do on a daily basis to ensure that we are meeting our own high standards:

• Best in the World: When it comes to our key ingredients, we don't cut corners. Whether it's nuts from Italy, vanilla from Madagascar, or chocolate from Belgium - we invest in the best. Of course we could buy cheaper substitutes that would improve our profit margin but we didn't open Gelateria Gondola to make what anyone else can make. We're proud to offer our customers world-class, award winning, small-batch, artisanal gelato.

• Shop Local: When it comes to our fresh ingredients, our commitment to making our gelato and sorbet fresh daily extends to buying the best local produce available. We refuse to use pre-packaged syrups, powders and gels even though doing so would make life easier and cheaper. When we name our flavours after a fruit for example, you can be assured that it is made from scratch using that actual fruit. You can also count on that fruit coming from a local grower rather than a big supermarket chain because we believe in supporting local farmers. This means that our flavours change with the seasons and that no two batches are ever exactly the same.

• Community Matters: Chatswood is a long way from Italy but it's now our home. Our customers are our friends and neighbours and we appreciate all the love, loyalty and support that we've been given in our years here on Archer Street. Whenever possible, we like to give back to the community by sponsoring local school events and running special group workshops in our on-premises kitchen. We also value our customer feedback, often creating special flavours from your suggestions and recreating old favourites.

• Green Power: A gelateria uses a lot of energy, especially as we do everything from scratch in our kitchen including pasteurizing our own milk. We are conscious of the strain this puts on the environment so we made the decision to switch to 100% green energy over a year ago and we haven't looked back since!

• Cutting waste: As a predominantly take-away business, we're also aware of the waste that is generated by our trade and do our best to minimise it. One significant way we've managed to do this is by offering customers who'd like to sample a flavour before they choose, a taste of a second flavour on the other end of the stick. In doing this, and limiting it to one stick per customer, we've noticed a genuine decline in the amount of garbage we're throwing away.

• Sustainable Packaging: It's been an ongoing struggle for us to find packaging that is both sustainable and which meets our performance standards in order to best preserve the gelato we work so tirelessly to create. We're excited to have recently found biodegradable takeaway containers which we trialed with our loyal customers. Customer feedback was key in our decision to continue stocking these containers for most journeys. Whilst we've had to keep a stock of older containers for longer trips, we will continue to research new and more sustainable alternatives as they become available.

There are certainly more savvy and profit-motivated ways of doing business but Gelateria Gondola has always been, and always will be, a labour of love - we love what we do so we do it in a way that we love. It makes a difference to us; we hope it makes a difference to you too.