We, the Brolly Sheets and Independently You team, design and manufacture waterproof textile products with heart and integrity. We believe in allowing our customers to live with dignity by creating products that feel great and look fabulous. We believe in being ethical, sustainable and kind in everything we do. We make our products to last and believe in buying once and buying well.
Social Responsibility
Our company is led by founder Diane Hurford, who started by creating products for her own family. Diane is family focused and brings this into any new products she creates, whether they were for her children or people she meets along the way.
Since 2006, Diane has been forming strong relationships with our suppliers. We are proud that the majority of our products come from one small factory in the Chinese countryside, that pays their team by the hour for the time they work, not by the piece. This reinforces our fabulous quality as they are not rushed, and means our Chinese team have the time to chat and laugh with each other. A small country factory also allows the women working there to go home to their families each night. A basic right not afforded to many other factory workers that are set up in big factories, in large cities, whose workers go home twice a year during the longer public holidays.
We have developed an Ethical Code of Conduct that covers key issues of slave labour, child labour, safety and diversity. Please check out our Supplier Code of Conduct here.
Inclusiveness
At Brolly Sheets, we pride ourselves on having a strong family culture, where our team feel supported, respected and valued. We firmly believe everyone has the right to be equal and not judged by their gender, ability or ethnicity and in creating an environment that embraces diversity, fosters equal opportunities, and celebrates the unique perspectives and talents of every individual.
Our team is diverse, comprising of women, men, and a non-binary individual. In addition, our team represents various nationalities, including South African, Dutch, Colombian, British, American, and Kiwis.
Through our commitment to inclusivity, we strive to create an environment where everyone feels a sense of belonging, where their voices are heard, and where their talents are acknowledged and appreciated. By harnessing the strength of our diverse team, we cultivate an atmosphere of creativity, collaboration, and mutual respect that fuels our collective growth and prosperity.
Sustainability
Packaging
We are moving toward non-plastic packaging to lessen waste and reduce landfill. We have moved to fabric bags for our Brolly Sheets and fitted waterproof sheets and cardboard wrappers for our waterproof underwear and bibs. The fabric bags are reused by our customers to store toys, used as Christmas Gift bags vs paper wrap, and taking on holidays and filled with clean or dirty laundry.
We will be working through our remaining products until we are fully plastic packaging free.
Meanwhile, we’ve challenged our suppliers to come up with new, sustainable ways to manufacture and package our products – without sacrificing on quality.
To ship to you, we use home compostable courier satchels to minimise plastic waste.
Office Waste
Cardboard
We recycle or reuse all cardboard cartons from our suppliers. We recycle through a commercial cardboard recycling service that processes the cardboard into new products such as:
- Cardboard Boxes
- Paperboard
- Packaging Material
- Egg Cartons
- Corrugated Cardboard
- Soft plastics
Soft Plastics
We are working on reducing these and what we do have, we recycle through a commercial recycling service who returns it to its raw material form to eventually be reused in the manufacturing process.
Office and Kitchen waste
We have washable containers if the team wants to pop out and get sushi or something fresh for lunch. Washable coffee cups to get their daily coffee fix at local cafes and a recycle bin in the kitchen. We are actively working on reducing paper across the company by using digital communication and digital documents to file. Our office is totally paperless.
Disposable Underwear
We design and make both cloth nappies and disposable underwear. In an ideal world, everyone would be using sustainable and reusable products for everything. However, when it comes to nappies, we understand that for many of our customers disposables are a much better fit for their needs and lifestyles. Just think of all those baby disposables used and the output from a baby. Now picture that same scenario with a 30-year-old man, or a 18-year-old student who wants to fit in and have a product that will last through several lectures at uni.
So we created Texi.
In order to try and offset the waste created from disposables we have made our disposable underwear as environmentally friendly as possible. As a result, Texi are made from 30 - 39% sustainable materials. We are certified to ensure that the pulp in our disposable underwear comes from well-managed forests and controlled sources. We hope in the future we will be able to increase this number and make our Texi Disposable Underwear even more environmentally friendly.