Code of Conduct

Our Environmental Commitment

At Metta Play, we want to play our part in building a sustainable future and making a positive impact on the planet. We are committed to achieving environmental sustainability in the way we make our products. From materials to packaging, we are working to achieve carbon zero waste and having environmental standards in place to ensure we are only making a positive impact in our society.

Our objectives are to protect natural resources by focusing on materials, and to reduce climate impact by focusing on greenhouse emissions. We believe that our contribution can make a significant difference if we work across the world to bring our providers and partners together to beat climate change.

We strive to continually improve performance by embedding sustainability into our everyday lives. We actively engage providers and partners to assume responsibility for environmental activities. We embrace technology that enables us to measure and evaluate our progress towards our environmental goals.

We are committed to researching, innovating and creating more circular products and packaging by design as we believe our products should never become a waste. We consider the environmental concerns and impacts for our products and packaging including the use of sustainable material, product development, distribution, consumer use and disposal.

We engage actively with our suppliers to influence their environmental awareness and to help improve their climate impact. We seek to actively work with environmentally conscious and committed suppliers.

 

Our Commitment to Diversity and Inclusion

Our mission is to inspire and develop kids' creativity and self care through our products. Diversity and inclusion in the workplace are vital in reaching, inspiring and developing our society. We succeed together in a diverse workplace where everyone can reach their full potential.

Diversity encompasses age, gender, experience, education, ethnicity, religious, cultural backgrounds. Lifestyle and family responsibilities are other critical dimensions. We work with a broad definition of diversity and our goal is to increase representation of all dimensions to reflect the increasingly diverse global marketplace we operate in. Our priority is building a diverse and inclusive workforce, where everyone feels valued, and can contribute fully to our company and to society.

When we speak about diversity, we mean it! We work on so many aspects across Metta Play to ensure our diversity and inclusion policy is a real matter. Some of our actions include:

Building inclusion capability within our organization. Our leadership model emphasizes the importance of inclusion. We each play a part in creating a safe space for everyone to be seen, heard, valued, and respected.

Leadership is the act of energizing everybody every day and a responsibility we all share as part of Metta Play.

We do not tolerate discrimination, harassment or bullying. We want everyone at Metta Play to share their experience and perspective in a respectful, fair, and safe environment. For further details on our policies, including what constitutes discrimination, harassment or bullying, please reach us at hello@mettaplay.com

 

CORPORATE POLICIES

Fair Labor Commitment

Metta Play does not employ anyone who has not reached the age of 16.

No one who is employed at Metta Play shall be discriminated against because of their race, physical disability, illness, religion, sexual orientation, political views, age, nationality or gender. We forbid any manner of physical, sexual, psychological or verbal harassment or abuse to its employees, as well as any other behavior which may create an intimidating, offensive or hostile environment

Our employees have the right to associate or organize themselves or to collectively bargain their salaries. Working hours and overtime shall not exceed the statutory limit set forth in the applicable laws and regulations in each country. Overtime shall always be voluntary and paid according to labor laws. Our employees are paid wages in accordance with the duties performed, always respecting the agreements of each sector in each country.

All our employees perform their work in safe and healthy workplaces.

 

Our Commitment with our Staff and external Workforce

We undertake to offer to all our customers a high standard of excellence, quality and safety in all our products, and to have a smooth and transparent communication with them.

Such products are manufactured in an ethical and responsible manner.

Our business partners are bound to comply with the contents of this Code. Manufacturers which produce the goods sold by Metta Play are bound to comply with this Code of Conduct. Likewise, they shall allow any monitoring by Metta Play or any authorized third parties, to verify such compliance. We always undertake to collaborate with the local and federal authorities where we operate to make sure our workforce is recruited and works in a safe and healthy environment.

We consider individuals to be a key business factor in upholding and promoting observance of labor rights and to enforce the regulations and best practices in the field of employment conditions and health and safety at work. We require our staff, leadership and business partners the strict observance of applicable employment standards and the prevention, detection and removal of any irregularity with this respect.

All Metta Play employees are bound to interact with other employees, under the premise of respect and dignity, taking into account the different cultural background of each individual, without allowing any form of violence, harassment or abuse in the workplace, or any form of discrimination on account of race, religion, age, nationality, gender or any other personal or social condition beyond the qualifications required for a specific function within Metta Play. Everyone at Metta Play is responsible for strictly meeting all health and safety work standards and for ensuring the safety of every individual impacted by our activities.

Our executive leadership will provide guidance to the health and safety functions at all locations to ensure that both, occupational health and safety standards, are achieved in the following areas:

  • Safety: Leadership will plan and carry out all activities in a safe way for all employees. Through on-going workplace assessments, we strive to eliminate all applicable hazards where possible and where this is not possible, minimize all harmful exposure to our employees.
  • Health: We wish to stimulate our employees’ wellbeing and opportunity to live a healthy lifestyle. It is our responsibility to provide an appropriate environment for developing and sustaining healthy working conditions, through health promoting initiatives.
  • Work Planning: Our leadership is required to involve and plan the work of our staff in a way which accommodates a good balance between work requirements and leisure and recreation activities to minimize stress among employees.
  • Improvement: We aim to continuously improve the working environment at Metta Play. This is done by striving at improving performance indicators by learning from working with our advisors on health and safety management and best practices. Our leaders are required to communicate and familiarize our staff with this policy and it is important that they take our health and safety policies seriously by implementing all applicable procedures..

It is vital to the success and effective implementation of this policy, to take reasonable care of our own individual health and safety, and anyone else who may be affected by our actions. In addition, all employees have a right and duty to bring to the leadership’s attention any circumstances which in their opinion are unreasonable or harmful to other individuals or the company. In maintaining a healthy and safe working environment, we expect all visitors, contractors, temporary employees and anyone working in our facilities, to adopt the same approach to managing and maintaining good health and safety standards and to cooperate with us by applying the principles of this policy.

 

Our Commitment to our customers

Metta Play´s employees are required to treat our customers with respect and dignity, taking into account the different cultural background of each individual, without allowing any discrimination for race, religion, age, nationality, gender or any other personal or social condition. At Metta Play, we protect our customers by setting forth and enforcing mandatory standards on all our suppliers to ensure product safety.

Our employees must make sure that the above referred standards are duly met, as well as any other rules, regulations and procedures, regarding labelling, quality and features of our products.

In the course of their business activities, Metta Play’s employees promote our products based upon objective standards, without distorting their description or features.

Metta Play carries out every promotional activity in an honest manner so as not to provide false or deceptive information which may mislead our customers or third parties. Likewise, contents shown in promotional and advertising materials present or promote the image of everyday life kids, preventing presenting cut off from reality stereotypes of children of a particular race or ethnicity.

 

Our Commitment to Market Transparency

Metta Play is a loyal competitor within the market and it does not admit any misleading, dishonest or malicious conduct whatsoever.

Our employees shall carry out any research for commercial or market information without infringing any regulations protecting it. Employees shall reject any information about any competitor improperly gathered or gathered in breach of the confidentiality kept by the lawful owners of such information. Special attention is drawn to not breaching any secret of the company where professionals from other competing companies of the industry would join Metta Play.

Our employees must at all times refrain from disclosing any malicious or false information about the competitors of Metta Play.

At Metta Play we take a close look to any unscheduled payments to or by any third parties not previously mentioned in the relevant agreements, or payments made to any bank account other than the usual one used in the transactions with any given organization or individual; payments made to or by any individual, company, organization or to any account opened anywhere that is deemed to be a tax haven and those payments made to organizations whose shareholder, owner or ultimate beneficiary cannot be identified.

We require our finance team to observe compliance with all regulations regarding the onboarding of new clients, origin of goods, supervising compliance with the standards and procedures laid down by the company in this Code of Conduct, and the relevant agreements with our retailers and clients around the world.

 

Relationship with our suppliers

Metta Play thrives at maintaining a lawful, ethical and respectful relationship with its suppliers. The choice of suppliers shall be governed by the principles of independence and transparency, combining the interest of the company in achieving the best conditions, with that of maintaining stable relations with ethical and responsible suppliers

Any and all suppliers working with Metta Play shall undertake to observe ethical human and labor practices and, we look for each one of our business partners to convey these principles to their employees and any third parties collaborating or working with them.

Under no circumstance Metta Play will accept the violation of any of the principles laid out in this section. Any activity within the scope of purchases and procurement will be carried out in full compliance with the prevailing corporate regulations and procedures in force. All decisions made within this scope shall be evidenced, that is they shall be properly documented and recorded in the event of a review by any third parties and internal auditors.

Our staff is bound to protect any commercially sensitive information regarding the terms and conditions set forth by the company's procurement policy. No one at Metta Play will demand or accept from suppliers any information regarding the terms agreed with any of our competitors.

Our employees may not offer, grant, apply for or accept, either directly or indirectly, any gifts, handouts, favors or compensations, whether in cash or in kind, regardless of the nature thereof, that might have an impact in the decision-taking process in connection with the performance of the duties pertaining to their office. Any gifts or handouts received in breach of the provisions of this Code shall be forthwith returned and this fact must be reported to Metta Play´s executive leadership. In case any gift or handouts could not be practically returned to the source of origin, these shall be contributed to a charity.

No Metta Play employee may offer, grant, apply for, or accept any gifts or handouts from any individuals or corporate body for an amount whether on its own or added up within one year which exceeds One Hundred US Dollars ($100) or the equivalent amount thereof in local currency. Cash gifts are expressly forbidden.

 

Relationship with public authorities and public servants

Metta Play is committed to maintaining lawful, ethical and respectful relationships with the authorities and public institutions in such countries where it conducts business, in line with international regulations on anti-corruption and anti-bribery policies.

No Metta Play employee will be involved in any relationship with representatives of public authorities without obtaining prior express authorization from the company's leadership. Any staff member involved with procuring a license, permit, or any administrative decision shall formally document all activities carried out to procure such administrative decision, and evidence compliance with internal and external regulations, in order to help any third parties and internal control bodies within the company to review regulatory compliance in this field.

As a rule of thumb, none of our employees or executive leaders may offer, grant, demand or accept, whether directly or indirectly, any gifts or donations, favors or compensations, regardless of their nature, to or from any public authorities or servants. The foregoing does not apply, however, to such gifts and tokens of scarce economic value, equitable and reasonable according to local practice, and transparent, and which are given on account of lawful, socially accepted interests, and which are occasional to avoid that their contents or recurrence might lead any independent third party to question the good faith of the employee or the company.

Cash gifts are expressly forbidden.

It is incumbent on each employee to be duly informed and to appropriately assess local practices, taking into account the interest and good name of the company. In case of any concerns, they shall be addressed to the executive leadership.

Usual practices about gifts and tokens are frequently monitored, assessed and registered by the company.

Our employees are required to refrain from making any facilitating or expediting payments, consisting of giving out money or any other valuables, regardless of their amount, in order to ensure or speed up any bureaucratic proceeding, regardless of its nature, vis-à-vis any court, public administration or official agency.

Employees shall avoid getting any undue tax benefit for Metta Play and shall make sure that the information reported in this field to the tax authorities is true and accurate and fairly presents the real status of the company. They shall also make sure that aid demanded or received from public authorities is duly allocated and that the application for such aid is transparent, without resorting to tampering the application so as to be granted such aid, or allocating it to any use other than the one for which it was granted.

In such countries where there are requirements and restrictions regarding international trade, our staff will strictly comply with the prevailing regulations in force and shall provide the required information on their activities to any authority which may legally and legitimately request it.

 

Conflicts of Interest

We request our staff and leadership to avoid any situation which might entail any conflict between their personal interests and those of the company.

We require our employees to refrain from representing the company and from taking part or having a say in any decision making wherein they may have, either directly or indirectly, either themselves or through any related party, any personal interest. They may not avail themselves of their position in the company to obtain any economic or personal benefit, or any business opportunity for them.

We ask our employee to abstain from rendering services as consultant, director, officer, employee or advisor to any of our competitors, except for such services which may be rendered at the request of Metta Play or with the authorization of our executive leadership.

We respect the private life of our employees and therefore the private sphere of their decisions. Under this policy of respect, our employees are urged to report to our executive leadership of any personal conflicts of interest or any conflicts of interest involving their relatives, that might jeopardize the necessary independence and professionalism required to perform their duties within Metta Play, so that, with regards to the confidentiality and privacy of individuals, the relevant measures are taken for the mutual benefit of the company and of the affected individuals. Namely, the cases below shall be considered as potential situations of conflict of interest and they shall be reported to the executive leadership:

  • To conduct, by any employee or by any person related to said employee, either directly or indirectly, by themselves or through any company or institution, any business which is the same, similar or supplementary to the business conducted by Metta Play.
  • To conduct, by any employee or by any person related to him/her, either directly or indirectly, by themselves or through any company or institution, any business which involves an exchange of goods and/or services similar to those traded by Metta Play.
  • To develop any working or professional activities other than those carried out for our company, where this will not diminish the efficiency required in the performance of their duties.
  • To perform any professional activity outside that of Metta Play that might affect Metta Play. Any activities during working hours for the company shall be previously authorized by the executive leadership.

At Metta Play we develop our business model without having any political interference in those communities where we carry out our manufacturing, distribution, and marketing activities. Any relationship that Metta Play may have with any government, authorities, institutions and political parties shall be based upon the principles of legality and neutrality.

Contributions, whether in cash and/or in kind that might be made by Metta Play, where applicable, to any political parties, institutions and public authorities, shall always be made in accordance with the current legislation in force and ensuring the transparency thereof; for such purposes, a previous report by our Legal Department evidencing that any such contributions are lawful, is be required.

The right of the employees to take part in lawful political activities is hereby acknowledged, provided that said activities would not interfere with the appropriate performance of their work for Metta Play and that they would take place during non working hours and outside any of our facilities so that these activities may not be attributed to the company.

 

Use of Metta Play's resources and facilities

We aim to make at all times a secure and efficient use of the goods and services of Metta Play, and our staff and leadership is requested not to use any of the available resources of the company for their own profit.

Our staff will refrain from using any equipment made available to them by the company to install or download any software, application or contents whose use is illegal, which infringe the regulations of the company or which may damage its reputation.

Employees shall not use either any monies or cards of the company to pay for any proceedings not inherent in their professional activity or their function.

Our employees are aware that documents and data included in IT systems and equipment provided to them by Metta Play may be subject to review by the relevant area within Metta Play or any independent third parties appointed by the company itself, where necessary and whenever prevailing regulations in force so permit.

 

Confidentiality of information and personal data protection

Metta Play believes it is fundamental for its organization to protect the information and know-how generated within the organization, or that has been trusted to us.

We request our staff to abstain from using for their own benefit any data, information or document obtained in the course of their professional activities or our company's operations.

Likewise, we will never disclose any information to any third parties, except where this is required by the applicable laws, or the internal regulations of our company or where they are expressly authorized to do so by MettPlay´s executive leadership.

Additionally, we will never use any confidential data, information or document originating in any third company without its express authorization in writing.

We undertake to keep confidential, and to use confidential information as per our Privacy Policy. As a rule of thumb, and unless otherwise stated, any information made available to our staff and executive leadership will be deemed to be confidential, and will be used exclusively for the purposes for which it was obtained.

Also, we will not copy, reproduce or use the information for any purposes other than what is required for the performance of our operational activities, and we will not store it in any IT systems other than those the property of Metta Play, unless where expressly authorized.

Our staff respects the personal privacy and the privacy of the family of any individual, whether employee or otherwise, whose personal data is made available to such employees.

The authorization to use any data shall be granted in connection with specific and duly supported applications. We strictly comply with any regulations, whether internal or external, set forth to ensure the lawful and necessary processing of information and data provided to the company by any third parties.

Regarding the gathering of personal data of customers, employees, suppliers or any individual or company involved in any contractual relationship or otherwise with us, it is part of our Privacy Policy to secure the required consents, and we undertake to use such data for the purposes expressly consented.

Our staff is constantly being trained to observe all internal procedures implemented regarding storage, custody and access to data, to ensure an optimal level of protection for the data we hold. Our employees are required to report to our executive leadership any incident they might detect concerning confidentiality of information or personal data protection.

 

Protection of Metta Play’s and third party's Proprietary rights

We are committed to protecting IP ownership, whether ours, or of others. This covers, among others, copyrights, patents, trademarks, domain names, reproduction rights, design rights, database extraction rights and rights on technical expertise.

We care for the originality of our own designs and take preventive measures to make sure that our suppliers do it as well, to ensure that the designs they provide to Metta Play are original and do not infringe any third party rights.

We do not use any works, creations or patented designs of third parties, without the prior evidence that the company relies on the required licenses. We take every necessary step to protect third parties´ IP rights, and procure that all our processes and decisions within this field are traceable, in that they should be documented, duly supported in records, and subject to verification.

 

Records

Any and all transactions carried out by Metta Play which may have an economic impact are clearly and accurately shown on our company's records, and they are a true representation of the facts and the transactions carried out, and are made available to our internal and external auditors.

Our employees are required to enter any and all financial information on the company’s systems in a full, clear and accurate manner, so that they accurately reflect factual information in accordance with the applicable regulations.

Additionally, we ensure that the accuracy and integrity of the financial information is maintained at all times, specially that that we are required to disclose to our customers, suppliers, and retailers.

We undertake to implement and maintain an appropriate internal control system on financial reporting, to ensure the effectiveness and efficiency of such reporting systems. Accounting records shall be at all times made available to our internal and external auditors.

Metta Play Reviews

Hey, it's Via! Thank you, truly, from the bottom of my heart - for taking the time to share your experience with us. Our bilingual yoga and affirmation cards were thoughtfully made for you and your tiny humans. If you have any feedback or questions, feel free to contact me directly at hello@mettaplay.com

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