Plastic-Free, Piece by Piece: How Sweat Bibs Is Built Differently

It's easy to call a brand "sustainable." It's harder to actually be one — and to keep being one as you grow. We don't claim to have it all figured out. But we do try to find every place plastic could hide in our gear, and remove it.

Here's where we are so far, honestly laid out.

The Fabric

This is the obvious one. Most activewear is polyester, nylon, or a synthetic blend — all forms of plastic. We use natural fibres: cotton, organic cotton, hemp, and linen. Where we use a small amount of elastane in our Muay Thai shorts, it's because the alternative is gear you can't kick or squat in, and we'd rather be transparent about that trade-off than pretend we've found a 100% natural solution that performs.

The Logo

Most printed logos on clothing are plastic-based — plastisol screen prints, PVC transfers, vinyl. Even on garments marketed as eco, this is the bit that quietly isn't.

We use two methods, both chosen carefully. The Sweat Bib and the back of the Muay Thai shorts are embroidered with a cotton/rayon thread blend — actual stitching, no ink, no film, no synthetic binder. The rest of the range carries logos applied with an eco-friendly, water-based heat press using rubber paste. It's not embroidery, but it sits at the genuinely eco end of the printing spectrum: water as the carrier, no solvents, no plastisol, no PVC.

The direction of travel is clear: more embroidery across the range, season by season, as we get there. Right now we're somewhere on the journey — honest about where, and clear about where we're going.

The Dyes

We use eco-friendly dyes wherever the fabric and design allow. The textile dye industry is one of the largest polluters of waterways globally, and choosing better dyes is one of the more invisible but more impactful decisions a small brand can make. The colours might look a touch softer than what you'd see on synthetic gear under bright lights — that's the trade, and we'll take it.

The Packaging

Our products ship in a cassava-based biodegradable bag. Cassava is a plant. The bag breaks down. It does the job a polybag does without the polybag.

We don't use plastic mailers, plastic tape, or plastic fillers. Even the swing tags are plastic-free.

A Fellow Brand Worth Knowing About

Once your gear is yours, the way you wash it matters too. Most laundry detergents come in plastic bottles or jugs and contain a long list of synthetic chemicals.

Lucent Globe is a small, fair dinkum Aussie brand making plant-based laundry detergent sheets — no plastic, no jugs, just sheets. We're not in a partnership with them. We just love what they do, we use their stuff at home, and they care about the same things we care about. As a thank-you for orders over $150, we tuck a box of their sheets in.

It's the kind of small Australian business we want to put a spotlight on. Better products, made with real care for people and the environment. Worth knowing about whether or not you ever buy from us.

The Future Range

We're not done. The product line is still small, and there's a lot we want to add — t-shirts, hoodies, caps, a cotton wash bag for your Sweat Bibs and your hand wraps, cotton carry bags for gloves and shin pads, hand wraps with the Sweat Bib built in, leggings, bra tops, shorts with pockets (because: pockets).

Each new product will go through the same questions. What's the fabric? What's the logo? What's the dye? What's the bag it ships in? Where does it come from?

The answers might not always be perfect. Sometimes the best available option has a compromise in it. When that happens, we'll tell you.

What This Doesn't Make Us

It doesn't make us perfect. Our gear is made overseas — in Indonesia, with a manufacturer we genuinely trust, but overseas all the same. We're not carbon-neutral. We're a small brand still figuring out our supply chain.

But "not perfect" isn't the same as "not trying." Every product, every season, the goal is to find the next thing we can do better. Sometimes that's a fabric switch. Sometimes that's a packaging change. Sometimes it's a logo that took six months longer to set up because we wouldn't accept a printed one.

Why It Matters

You're putting this on your body, often when you're hot, sweating, and most absorbent. The gear you train in shouldn't be working against the reasons you're training in the first place.

That's the whole project.