At Recycled Mats, we talk a lot about making ethical mats. Our core business is stocking a range of comfy, practical mats that are made from repurposed materials, like car tyres and plastics. You CAN create stylish, funky décor without destroying the planet!
We also love to celebrate world culture via our mats. We are committed to using authentic designs that reflect community stories and values, created by artists from Australia, New Zealand, Malaysia, the Pacific Islands and India.
Naturally, this leads to lots of questions about how we source and pay for our designs. We often get emails from conscientious clients asking why we produce some of our mats overseas, for example. Do royalties go back into Indigenous communities? Are your authentic cultural mats actually produced in faraway sweatshops? It’s only natural to be sceptical in this era of unethical mass production.
We’ve put together some of the most commonly asked questions here. Let us explain a bit about the processes we go through to ensure our products are ethical and beneficial to artists and their communities.
Are your cultural designs authentic? YES.
Historically, there’s been considerable exploitation of local artists in Australia and elsewhere. The bustling Australian tourism industry, for example, creates an interest in souvenir boomerangs, didgeridoos, tea towels and t-shirts emblazoned with Australian Indigenous artworks. In the past, many of these artworks were either:
- reproductions of an original artwork, for which the artist was never paid, or
- ‘pretend’ Indigenous art, created by someone in a factory with no connection to Indigenous communities.
It is clearly unfair for a working artist to be denied payment for their creative efforts. What’s more, appropriating Indigenous art can result in widespread sharing of an image that is sacred or meant for viewing by specific people in a community. Someone with little understanding of the complex symbolism at work in Indigenous art could easily misrepresent an important cultural message.
In recent years, activists and policy-makers have worked harder to ensure that Indigenous artists receive appropriate payments and/or royalties for their work.
At Recycled Mats, we work with local artists to commission designs. Artists are paid via royalty arrangements, paid out quarterly, 10% of the price the product has sold for ex GST. We promote the artists as individuals as well as the messages they wish to share via their designs. Every design is appropriate for viewing by the wider public and approved for walking or sitting on.
Our artists have diverse backgrounds and careers. Some are city-dwelling hipsters, some are rural business people. Wherever they live, their vibrant artwork reflects a complex relationship with ancestry, spirituality, and country, which we’re proud to showcase via Recycled Mats.
Are your artists paid fairly for their designs? YES.
10% commission is paid each quarter against the selling price of the item ex GST
Many of the artists we work with also resell their mat designs through their own businesses and channels too, thereby making ongoing income from their designs.
Do local communities see any benefit from the sale of your products? YES.
Our artists are paid fairly for their designs, always. Beyond that, the production of our mats also benefits the wider community.
Our products highlight an important environmental message about the benefits of recycling. Did you know that by July 2021, we'd repurposed almost 260,000kg of materials, saving them from landfill?? We're very proud of that!
Our mats also give the world a taste of the amazing images, symbols and colours available through multicultural art. Our mats are very popular as classroom mats, for example, allowing children to learn about culture while they eat, read or play. In homes, offices and campsites these contemporary designs break down prejudices and melt the distinctions between ‘décor’ and ‘educational tools’ by celebrating creativity from around the world.
We work hard to keep our prices reasonable to help get the artists’ messages out there to as many people as possible. We sell wholesale to some Indigenous community groups too, who then resell our products, creating an income for themselves and their families. We often donate rugs to community groups to thank them for their business, and to help them continue the work they do in unifying and supporting local people.
Up until June 2020, we worked with The Family Centre organisation called "Creating Opportunites Fund". We contributed by donating 100% of the net profits of our 'Family Is Centre' Mat to The Family Centre (now sold out) in Tweed to help them with their work supporting local Indigenous and non-Indigenous families. All profits contribute to assisting families under financial strain with the cost of school uniforms and excursions, tutoring and tuition, instruments, books, computer equipment or sports club fees and uniforms.
In July 2020 we made a conscious decision to support the environment rather than community groups and now pledge to fund 1,000 trees per year. A choice we made as a business after the devasting impacts of the 2020 bushfires across much of the Southern States - learn more about this here
Are your products made locally? YES & NO
At present, the majority of our cushions, doormats, mousepads, wine coolers (to name just a few!) are made in Australia. Our recycled plastic, chindi and woollen rugs are made in China and India. You can read a longer post about exactly why we manufacture offshore here. And we are excited to soon be working on a new recycling venture right here in NSW...watch this space for more information as it comes to hand!
The short answer is that we want to keep our mats affordable and we want to meet demand. We use ethical factories overseas, which we have personally inspected, that are able to access materials, keep up with production times and create products to the high standard we expect for our clients, at a reasonable cost.
Rest assured that when we started Recycled Mats, we did consider the possibility of local artists or communities producing their own mats. We quickly learned that some of our artists had no interest in weaving. They are busy creating designs for us, as well as for galleries, clothing, surfboards, tattoo parlours and a host of other products! They are very happy to work as creatives and leave someone else to specialise in making mats.
In other cases, it would have cost us millions to provide the infrastructure to a rural community for large-scale mat production. We could stock one-off handmade mats, but the price for these is significantly higher, which means they’re no longer an option for the likes of classrooms, libraries and community groups.
What we now offer is a compromise that benefits everyone. It allows our business to stay in business, while we do ‘our bit’ for artists, communities and the environment.
Are you an Australian Business? YES
Yes, we are a family business living in the Tweed Shire. As of June 2023, the business employs 9 local staff who all live across Queensland & New South Wales. Our profits stay in Australia.
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