Sustainability & Impact | Fishtown Pickle Project

Pickling With Purpose

Fishtown Pickle Project was born out of a love for flavorful, nutritious food that has the power to bring a community together. Each jar is an opportunity to make our neighborhood a little brighter and our environmental impact a little lighter.

Our Sustainability

Reducing Food Waste At Every Step
You’ll find every single edible part of the cucumbers and vegetables in our jars, which is why they’re filled to the brim with spears and topped off with the remaining tasty pieces. Our team composts any parts of the veggies that can’t be used and teaches community members how to reduce their own waste at home during our pickling classes.
Small Batch & Sustainably Sourced
Producing our pickles in small batches prevents the kind of excess waste that mass-produced foods generate and means we always use ingredients at peak freshness from our local suppliers. From July to September, 100% of our Kirby cukes are sourced from Muzzarelli Farms, a solar-powered, non-GMO, and family-owned business located just an hour from our pickling production site.

Glass That Keeps Giving
We take back empty pickle jars at farmers’ markets, at our space in Globe Dye Works, and at our classes to refill them for future batches. We also partner with Bottle Underground to collect and recirculate our containers as much as possible beyond pickles. Jars that can’t be reused are upcycled into new glassware or downcycled into glass sand that supports conservation projects.
Planet-Friendly Packaging
We package and ship in fully recyclable boxes, using compostable peanuts and kraft paper as padding. The insulated box liner necessary to keep our pickles chilled and crunchy can be reused, and our ice packs are made of biodegradable, non-toxic gel sealed in a recyclable polyethylene film. Plus, we only ship orders in quantities that utilize the entire box in order to minimize our carbon footprint.

SHOP ALL PICKLES

Our Impact

Caring For Our Community
We partner regularly with charitable organizations throughout the Philadelphia area, supporting causes that are important to our team and the neighborhood we pickle in.
We give back to our community across four pillars:
- Mental health
- Hunger relief
- Equity
- Education
Past & Present Impact Partners
We’ve supported Philabundance’s fight against food insecurity, Sharing Excess’s vision for a more equitable food system, Share Food Program’s fight against hunger in the Philadelphia region, and many more. We also regularly support the Association for Frontotemporal Degeneration’s #foodforthought campaign - a cause that’s personal to our founders - and the Attic Youth Center’s mission to provide a safe and supportive community for LGBTQ+ youth.