Frogmouth is a for-profit business that also seeks to be a model for a new social and economic order. We agitate socially, politically, and economically, we experiment, and we aim to honor our values, our humanity, and our environment in everything we do. We want our products to be valuable and useful, but also to do no harm, including emotional harm. Buying, wearing, seeing, and making a Frogmouth product, and seeing and making Frogmouth marketing and advertising, should never make anyone feel less than themselves. Our objective is to help amplify and celebrate—or, at the very least, never suppress—the humanity of each person involved in the use, promotion, and manufacture of our products and brand. We can always do better, and are always seeking to improve. We cut and sew all of our products at our facilities in Austin, Texas. We dye all of our products at our facilities in Austin, Texas with the exception of solid black fabric, which is pre-dyed by our supplier. These are some of the things we do now as part of our efforts to build a humane and ethical for-profit business:

 

Land Acknowledgment

We acknowledge that the land on which Frogmouth operates and most of its employees live is the seized territory of the Nʉmʉnʉʉ, Sana, and Tonkawa people. We encourage everyone to learn which indigenous people's territory they live on. There is an interactive map for identifying the traditional inhabitants of the land you’re on here, and the U.S. Department of Arts and Culture has a guide to land acknowledgment and honoring native land here

 

Accessibility


We firmly believe that the internet should be available and accessible to anyone, and are committed to providing a website that is accessible to the widest possible audience, regardless of circumstance and ability.

To fulfill this, we aim to adhere as strictly as possible to the World Wide Web Consortium’s (W3C) Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.1 (WCAG 2.1) at the AA level. These guidelines explain how to make web content accessible to people with a wide array of disabilities. Complying with those guidelines helps us ensure that the website is accessible to all people: blind people, people with motor impairments, visual impairment, cognitive disabilities, and more.

Our website utilizes various technologies that are meant to make it as accessible as possible at all times. We utilize an accessibility interface that allows persons with specific disabilities to adjust the website’s UI (user interface) and design it to their personal needs.

Additionally, our website utilizes an AI-based application that runs in the background and optimizes its accessibility level constantly. This application remediates the website’s HTML, adapts its functionality and behavior for screen-readers used by blind users, and for keyboard functions used by individuals with motor impairments. 

 

Environment 

Resource Management and Disposal 

We do not make "fast fashion." We cut, dye, and sew all our products to order at our facility in Austin, Texas, and they are designed and built to withstand several years of intense use and washing, including, where necessary, being able to survive the unique stresses of roller derby, a high-speed, full contact sport played by people wearing safety gear fastened using abrasive Velcro. All our gameplay products, such as our jerseys, are designed to endure roller derby with minimal pilling from contact with Velcro, to be machine washable to remove stank, and to be capable of withstanding the extreme strain of shirt whips, all so that they have a long life. In addition, we offer single-ply, dyed-on-both-sides, reversible jerseys, reversible helmet covers, and reversible armbands, all of which provide the equivalent of two products for the same amount of fabric and thread as one product. There is no minimum order for our uniform products, so we have no business incentive to encourage teams to change their uniform design regularly, and teams have no need to order more than they need, as new players can order uniforms individually at any time. We use high efficiency cutting techniques and use offcuts whenever possible. We recycle all transfer paper used to dye our garments, and also upcycle rejected dyed pieces as crop tops called "scrap tops" which take three rejected pieces and combine them to make one garment which we then sell. Almost all our products are made to order from one of three unpatterned fabrics: this means we almost never have to dispose of unsold finished goods, unused raw materials, or deadstock. We use minimal packaging materials to reduce waste and also space and fuel during shipping to customers. Items that are returned because of fit or other problems are, wherever possible, reused as size samples for new customers. We cut our fabric as efficiently as possible to avoid waste. Our fabric is a polyester-spandex blend made in Taiwan and sold to us by a US-based wholesaler. Our threads and manufacturing equipment come from various countries. 

Energy Use and Greenhouse Gas Emissions

We buy our electricity from a local electrical cooperative. We calculate that approximately 11% of our electricity comes from renewable wind and hydroelectric generation sources, 40% from natural gas, and 49% from coal mined in Wyoming. About 40% of the total natural gas generation, or about 16% of our total electricity, comes from a new higher efficiency/lower emission combined cycle power plant near Horseshoe Bay, Texas.

Chemicals Use and Disposal

The dyes we use are non-toxic, and non-hazardous and typically consist of 50% ~ 65% Water, 15% ~ 20% Glycerols, 1% ~ 3% pigment (e.g 5-nitro-2-(2-methyl-4-(diethylamino)phenylazo)thiazole), and 0.25% ~ 0.5% Triethanol amine. Any dye that is not transferred to a garment is recycled as part of our transfer paper recycling process.

Water Usage Policies and Practices

We work in a water efficient facility with, for example, low flow toilets and timer-shut off faucets. We do not contribute any manufacturing waste to the local water supply. 

 

Labor

Worker Rights and Worker Empowerment

All our employees have ownership of our company via stock options, and propose practices and policies on both an informal, ad hoc basis as well as at our annual team meeting. We hire, retain, and promote employees without unfair discrimination. Although we are a small company with little leverage, we expect our suppliers and their suppliers to do the same, and require all parties in our supply chain to honor the United Nations International Labor Organization's prohibitions on forced and compulsory labor and child labor. Frogmouth adheres to all four of the ILO's Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work, which includes giving our employees the right to associate freely and bargain collectively if they so choose. Because Taiwan is not a member of the United Nations, our Taiwanese fabric manufacturer instead adheres to the Labor Standards Act of the Taiwanese Ministry of Labor (勞動部), which can be found here. Our fabric wholesaler, which is our largest supplier, is 100% employee-owned via an employee stock ownership plan. 

Living Wage

We pay everyone a living wage, and are generous with employee leave and time off.

Equality, Equity, Inclusion, and Non-Discrimination

Currently, the majority of our team members are women, and we employ and are owned by people of various races, ethnicities, and gender identities, including people of color, who own almost half of the company. We have a zero tolerance policy for harassment, bigotry, oppression and exclusion, including by our customers and suppliers. In our Terms of Service we explicitly reserve our right to refuse service for reasons including but not limited to harassment and abuse of our team members; engagement in, association with, or explicit or tacit support for words or actions that are misogynistic; homophobic, transphobic, racist, ableist, body shaming, anti-semitic, Islamophobic, supportive of sexual assault, sexual predators, and rape culture, or otherwise intended to shame survivors, minorities, and people with specific identities. We expect all of our customers to honor the highest possible standards of non-discrimination. Customers that violate these standards, or that harbor or protect individuals that violate these standards, may find that they are unable to purchase products from us, or that their unfulfilled orders have been canceled and refunded without notice.

Restorative and Loving Justice*

We believe forgiveness and second chances can be earned through the atoning labor of honesty, integrity, courage, sincerity, and humility. If the whole story has been transparently told; if all systemic issues and unequal power dynamics have been identified and neutralized; if commitments and responsibilities to self and others have been carried out appropriately; if there has been sufficient self-reflection prior to, during, and after the atonement; if the atonements address the atoner's personal fears, insecurities and mistakes; if there is willingness to be corrected when future mistakes are made; if the atoning actions demonstrate humility; if personal responsibility has been taken for harmful actions; and if there has been respect for the inherent dignity and rights of all involved, then restorative, loving justice, should be possible, and it may be healthy for all concerned to seek it.

COVID-19

During the COVID-19 pandemic we staggered shifts so that everyone could be socially distanced, conducted activities remotely as much as possible, required the wearing of masks, encouraged and made time for employee vaccination, and also produced and sold masks, many on a buy one/give one basis, and donated the "give one" masks to hospitals and schools that had requested them.

Animals Policy

All our products our vegan, and we do not use any animals or animal products to manufacture them. We also encourage our employees to bring their pets to work whenever they want. Current regulars in our facility include Briskoe, who is tiny and energetic, and Lucky who gentle, affectionate, and looks like a dog-shaped polar bear.

 

Diversity and Inclusivity

Structural Racism and Settler Colonialism

We are vocal about structural racism, elevate and amplify BIPOC and AAPI voices within our organization and on our media platforms, and hire and commission BIPOC and AAPI artists. We feature models of all races in our product photographs and illustrations. We sponsored and actively supported roller derby teams from diverse nations including Iran, Costa Rica, Mexico, Argentina, Brazil, South Africa, the Philippines, and Aotearoa at the 2018 Roller Derby World Cup, and Side Eye of the Black Roller Derby Network at Rollercon 2019. We sponsor Golden City Rollers, one of the first roller derby teams in Africa, and Jewish Roller Derby, a team made up of skaters from the Jewish diaspora. We also make helmet-friendly roller derby hijabs for customers who need them.

Gender and LGBTQIA+

All our products are gender neutral—we sell straight cut and curve cut jerseys, rather than "men's" and "women's" styles, for example. We are vocal about LGBTQIA+ rights on our media platforms, and employ LGBTQIA+ team members. We offer the option to customize our roller derby uniforms with gender pronouns at no additional charge: customers can choose from a list of thirteen pronouns, or request custom pronouns if their pronouns do not appear on our list. We sell a large range of Pride and LGBTQIA+ themed products year round, and donate 10% of the sales price of these items to the Trevor Project, an American nonprofit organization founded in 1998, and focused on suicide prevention efforts among lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and questioning youth.

Body Positivity

All our items are available in sizes 3XS to 6XL and jerseys come in four lengths, all for the same price. We are vocal about body positivity on our media platforms. We show models of various sizes in our marketing and advertising. If a customer needs a size outside our range we will custom make it for them at no additional charge. We replace any items, including custom items, free of charge for any customer that does not love the fit and requests a replacement in accordance with our return policy.

Allergens

We aim to make our products comfortable and suitable for everyone. Our fabrics do not contain rubber; this includes our reversible armbands, which use special hypoallergenic synthetic material. 

We know we can always do better. If you see other ways in which we can improve ethically, or have questions about any of this information, please do not hesitate to contact us, either via the messaging feature in the bottom right corner of this page, or by sending a message to info@frogmouthclothing.com.

* The Restorative and Loving Justice section is based on the work of Kai Cheng Thom.