Minimum Carbon Footprint

"Eco-friendly" is a term often used as a marketing tool for many products. There is no denying that purchasing products labeled "eco-friendly" or "sustainable" or "recyclable" makes us feel better. These words are often used to persuade consumers to believe they are contributing to the preservation of our earth. However, purchasing a "made from natural rubber" yoga mat does not, in our opinion, qualify as "eco-friendly".

Natural rubber does come from a tree, therefore it is a sustainable material. But those trees do not exist in the United States. That means the natural rubber used in ALL natural rubber yoga mats produced and/or sold in the U.S. is imported from over 10,000 miles away. Shipped to the U.S. on cargo ships. 

What many people do not know is that cargo ships are the worst carbon footprint environmental polluters. Greatly contributing to the destruction of our ozone layers. A fact that is not in dispute. This means the negative effects of the carbon dioxide emissions created during the natural rubber / yoga mat transportation process from other continents can far outweigh any eco-friendly gain from using the natural rubber material.  

Shipping finished yoga mats (not just the natural rubber raw material) produced on other continents and sold in North America creates significant carbon footprints as well. We all need to consider these realities when making our everyday purchases if we truly want to act as stewards of our earth and natural resources. Moral of the story = Buy Local to reduce carbon footprints. 

We thought about these things greatly when creating our LuxeGrip™ yoga mat. A yoga mat that is manufactured in the U.S. all within 1 square mile. A yoga mat that avoids natural rubber and its harmful transportation effects. AshtaLuxe™ has done extensive R&D to be able to utilize, whenever possible, US and North American produced raw materials. Our mats contain less than 5% of raw materials sourced from outside the US.

If you are looking for a yoga mat that truly limits your total carbon footprint, you have found it in the LuxeGrip™ yoga mat by AshtaLuxe™.