Whole Foods' coffee brand, Allegro, isn't fair trade certified. When one approaches the coffee counter in different Whole Foods stores asking if their coffee is fair trade, employees are eerily identical in the answer they provide: their coffee is grown sustainably and fairly *just like* fair trade coffee, and doesn't need the label. I find this canned spiel pretty sketchy of Whole Foods and thought many others would too, but am finding many people buy it, and don't realize it's important to look for the fair trade logo. Now (partly to settle an argument in my house) I'm trying to figure out what exactly Whole Foods/Allegro is/isn't doing re conditions on its coffee farms or in its buying practices that keep it from that fair trade certification.

I have looked at the Fair Trade certification info on Global Exchange's web page. But I'm not aware of how Allegro stands up, i.e. against the minimum fair trade price for beans at $1.26 per lb., or whether Allegro fails to meet other criteria. Where would one look for that?