Jade Yoga is committed to making the world's best performing, most eco-friendly yoga mats, providing the highest level of customer service and giving back to the earth with every product.
Jade Yoga Mats are eco-friendly yoga mats made sustainably in the U.S. in compliance with all U.S. environmental laws with natural rubber, tapped from rubber trees and contains no PVC or other synthetic rubber.
Jade Yoga Mats are non-slip yoga mats with open cell natural rubber which guarantees optimum grip.
Jade Yoga Mats are comfortable yoga mats for better cushion and more resilience than any other yoga mat. Just feel the difference.
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Jade Yoga began long before launching its first purple and blue Harmony yoga mats in 2002. Jade Yoga grew out of Jade Industries, Inc., a company that had been making non-slip natural rubber rug pads for area rugs since the early 1970s and for many years sold rug pads to select yogis for use as yoga mats.
In fact, the birth of Jade Yoga really brought yoga mats full circle as the first yoga mat was a rug pad; as the story goes, B.K.S. Iyengar was in the United States doing a demonstration on an oriental rug, but he was slipping - a student took away the rug - leaving the pad and the first yoga mat was born. Strangely, the yoga mat that became the norm was made with cheap, imitation plastic - or PVC. It was also annoyingly slippery - almost useless for most yoga practices.
Jade Yoga began in earnest in 2000 after they were approached by a very savvy yogi who described the fundamental problem with most yoga mats on the market at that time - they were slippery. As Jade Yoga was already making natural rubber rug pads, they approached the problem from that angle and developed Harmony, the first natural rubber yoga mat.
Jade Yoga sent out something like 500 samples and got nearly 300 phone calls - an incredible response. People had never seen anything like this and Jade Yoga was thrilled to be able to produce a yoga mat that actually gripped. In addition, natural rubber has better cushion and resilience, making it more comfortable. Finally, tapped from rubber trees, natural rubber is a renewable resource and our yoga mats are made in the United States in compliance with U.S. environmental laws and contain no PVCs - making Jade Yoga yoga mats the first "green" yoga mats.
Jade Yoga's development of the first green yoga mat might be described as an accident - as the goal was to develop the best functioning yoga mat available. Because natural rubber performs so much better than synthetic rubber (PVC, PER, TPE, EVA), those synthetic rubbers were never really an option for Jade Yoga.
The first thing Jade Yoga did was resist the temptation to move production to China - where almost all other yoga mats are made today. This decision was made easy after a 2005 chemical spill into the Songhua River in China - which the Chinese government tried to cover up, not even letting the people downstream drinking the water know of the risks. This was further reinforced with all the recent problems with toys and foods coming out of China. While dollar costs may be lower with yoga mats made in China, it is just not worth it.
The second step was to commit to giving back to the earth with every yoga mat sold. Jade yoga mats are born from trees; so Jade Yoga decided to thank the trees by committing to plant a tree for every mat sold. And since 2006, through Jade Yoga's partnership with Trees for the Future, they have done just that.
Not only does Jade Yoga plant a tree for every yoga mat sold, they also try to help out many very special people and organizations trying to bring yoga to those who might benefit from it, but might not otherwise have a chance to try - from an abused girls shelter in West Africa to a homeless shelter in Indianapolis to supporting educational programs for children from New York to California.
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