Dan Abramson created Yoga Joes in the spirit of getting more people to try yoga. As he puts it, “They’re peaceful action figures designed to inspire children, men, and military veterans to try yoga. More unexpected folks are reaping the benefits of yoga today, from professional athletes, to children, to military men and women returning from wartime.”

So he started fooling around with classic green-plastic army men, heating them up and bending them into yoga positions. The idea was to make it possible to pass yoga around in a way other than a yoga class, maybe “as an inexpensive gift to friends and loved ones, who might like to give yoga a shot.” And he wanted to make something that was meaningful, but also funny as hell.

Dan put Yoga Joes on Kickstarter.com in September 2014 and by its deadline of October 10 he’d exceeded his funding goal by 270 percent. Since then Yoga Joes have been featured in media from Fast Company to Plastics Today, and all points in between.

Recently, Abramson opened a discussion with the organization Warriors at Ease about the possibility of starting a program for military kids in which the Joes would be purposed not only as a reward for donations, but also as a tool for teachers to use in classes.

This is an especially fun and meaningful project that truly has its heart in the right place. Dan contacted us to explore using the peaceful and soothing influence of bamboo in the packaging. “I wanted to replicate the feeling of yoga on a bamboo flooring in the display packing for our product,” said the inventor.

Through discussions and some modeling, we settled on Plyboo edge grain amber veneer for this application. The finish product should be available any day now.

We’ll post images as soon as they are available.