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Author: Joe
February 04, 2018Hi! If you're already a part of our community, thanks for checking in and seeing what's new. If you're new here, welcome to the neighborhood :)
The last year has been fun! We've now passed 150,000 trees planted, have expanded with more eco gear, and our community is steady growing.
We've found some new materials to work with, new partnerships, and have connected with some really great positive energy people both in business and with our ambassadors. We love you all! (you know who you are :D)
We are a worldwide community and we'd love you to join the adventure!
We hit 6 digits in 2017 by reaching 100,000 trees planted, and now have our targets set on hitting that 7 figure goal and plant 1 million trees!
Planting and education at CIRENAS
It might take a year, it might take a couple years but we are passionate about helping people and planet, and ambitious to succeed to not only give back, but also to show that this is the way businesses should operate - by contributing to a cause as the foundation of their business.
THANK YOU for helping us to plant 150,000 trees and counting!
Our newest 3 products each have their own story.
Plant based designs created by nature
We're working with creative crafters in Thailand for these. Leaf leather making is a traditional art practiced using sustainable techniques to harvest fallen tree leaves and turn them into a cool plant based leather alternative.
We love it, and have a detailed blog post about how it's made and what it is. Check out our What Is Leaf Leather post to learn more.
Nature inspired designs
We love yoga, we love being active. We also have a lot of yoga friends in our Tribe.
We wanted to create high quality yoga pants and active wear in a more eco friendly manner than what we're seeing available.
So we launched our new yoga pants that are created from recycled materials formed into high performance active wear. With quality materials and quality stitching, these are designed for max durability.
By using recycled polyester, rather than virgin polyester, we are contributing to help the recycling industry, while also not using the extra resources to create new polyester.
Because of the material being used, we can also print crazy cool high res designs that never fade, crack, or peel. So they stay fresh and like new to make them last nice for years.
Portable, hand made quality
We are in the battle against single use plastic. We want to create ways to easily be more environmentally conscious, and this is one with a story.
The bags are great, they tuck into an attached portable pouch that fits in your purse or pocket. And they are insanely strong with attention to quality.
We partnered with a company called Flying Squirrel Outfitters that make our favorite hammocks in the world!
The cool thing is, these are made from upcycled parachute hammock material.
Using scraps and extra fabric to turn into a useful product that helps the Earth just gives me the fuzzies!
FSO is also a social enterprise, employing and empowering women in small hill tribes in Thailand with good jobs, no set working hours, and a solid living wage - family-first style.
Our goal is to bring more attention to eco friendly materials and create high quality products with these materials.
We try to use natural materials when possible and feasible. But we also want our products to be super durable and last decades. Our Eco Water Bottles for example have a lifetime guarantee. We are proud of this and do a dance every time someone makes a purchase, knowing that it is saving tons of plastic bottles from being created and trashed.
When we use synthetic materials, we do it for a reason, and try to be as responsible as possible. Our leaf leather (as of this writing) has a BOPP outside layer. This makes it water proof, strong, and keeps the leaves underneath safe so their energy can live on for many years.
It's not easily biodegradable, but it's non toxic and only gives off water vapor and CO2 when incinerated.
We tried using a wax coating but it degraded within months, and overall left a lower quality feel.
We would rather have you buy something once and last for many years, rather than having to buy something every few months or year to replace it.
As we continue to grow our goal is to make our products even more sustainable, and seek out natural alternatives whenever possible.
We try our best to use the most eco friendly possible materials, while still making our products high quality and long lasting.
We care about how our products are made and want to be as ethical and eco friendly as possible in our entire supply chain. It's difficult as a small company with limited resources, but we go out of our way to find responsible production partners, and I (Joe the founder) have personally visited most of our partners.
We currently produce in USA, China, and Thailand, depending on the product, with a couple more countries/products in the works. We want to produce worldwide and plant trees worldwide. Our team is comprised of world travelers and we don't see borders as dividers. We love interacting with other cultures, and seek business relationships without judgement.
For every product that we launch, usually months of work goes into research, talking with multiple manufacturers, sampling, designing/prototyping, and ensuring a good partnership. It's important that our partners understand our principles and share our ethical values.
I've given a few talks on social enterprise to share what I've learned, and why it's a win-win-win for everyone, and I'm stoked to report that this movement is continuing to grow big time over the last couple years.
We hope to inspire other companies to give back to a cause as part of their business model. This is one of our long term goals, to inspire more companies to give back, and try to be more conscious about the materials they create with.
As we grow, we want to find more ways to inspire and help aspiring social entrepreneurs make a positive impact in the world.
Tree Tribe is only about 3 years old, but if you are just starting out think of us as your big brother and feel to reach out if you need advice or ideas for giving back with business.
Justin Cave hiking the entire Appalachian Trail
We like to highlight people doing cool things. We interview and write about these people in our Epic Adventure series.
Above is Justin Cave hiking the AT - check out his story here.
This is something I love doing - finding adventurers that vibe with our values and sharing their story. Admittedly it's been awhile since we featured one, as the primary contributor to this blog, and founder of Tree Tribe, I find my time slipping away and look up and weeks have gone in the blink of an eye!
I want to get back to regularly featuring more adventurers and working on expanding our team so we can get more involved with our communities.
We are a community driven brand and take every piece of feedback seriously. We take requests too and have created products or styles based on customer and fan ideas. We take care of our Tribe are looking for more ways to highlight our fellow adventurers and creators.
If you have feedback, ideas, or want to collaborate, the door is always open just give us a shout.
Our philosophy is to imagine our customers as friends and family members. We care about you, we want you to be happy. If you ever have a problem with a Tree Tribe product, we try our best to make it right.
We are not perfect, but we are a team of positive, good natured people that genuinely want you and the world to be happy. And we strive to make the Earth a better place.
Have an awesome year and thank you for being a part of our Tribe!
I'm into outdoor adventures, hiking, traveling, and having fun 😃 My goal is to make a positive impact on the world and live in harmony with the Earth.
Favorite nature spot: Any forest, probably Big Sur California
