About Us
Reflective Images is a designer jewelry manufacturer was founded in 1995. The company’s manufacturing operations and gallery is located on 912 Baca Street in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
Since its founding, the company has sold in hundreds of stores throughout North America. Their products have been featured in leading mail order catalogs, through premium and incentive companies, at retail shows and in their Santa Fe gallery. As of 2011, the main channels of distribution for the company are through premium and incentive companies, its websites and store.
Lines of Jewelry
The company is best known for their contemporary Celtic jewelry, designed primarily by is co-founder and Creative Director, Helen Chantler. The mixed metal fabrication techniques are rooted in traditional southwestern jewelry. The company does not design or fabricate using computer CAD programs. Wax carving is rarely used. Pieces are hand cut and stamped from sheet metal before being formed. This technique gives the work a refined yet hand hone look that stylistically has been a key to the company’s success. All pieces are made out of recycled gold and silver.
The same fabrication techniques are utilized in the company’s unique and unusual wedding rings which are also created from recycled gold and silver, fair trade gemstones and ethically sourced diamonds.
The Carousel Bead collection is a trend forward line of jewelry that taps into the collectible bead rage. Though designed in their Santa Fe location, is created at an Bali factory that employs fair trade manufacturing conditions.
Principles and Founders
Helen Chantler is the Creative Director and co-founder of the company. She was born in England and spent her teen years in the Far East. She is a self-taught designer and jeweler, with a degree in Sociology from the University of Wisconsin.
Marc Choyt is President of the company, focusing on marketing and strategic development. He was born in New England and has a BA in writing and English from Brown University and an MA in Humanities from St. John’s College.
Activism
Reflective Images supports a broad range of efforts to promote ethical sourcing in the jewelry sector. Marc Choyt is one of the key jewelry activists in North America. He founded of Fair Jewelry Action USA, an environmental justice and human rights organization within the jewelry sector with forty members from around the world. He is also publisher of the organization's website, www.fairjewelry.org, which he started in 2007. The site has since grown to be the most comprehensive trade and consumer resource on ethical jewelry production available anywhere. With its translator function, it is read by people from 130 countries a month, and receives several hundred visitors a day.
Choyt is also considered a leading authority in North America on fair trade and fair mined jewelry issues. As a journalist, he has published seminal articles in trade and consumer publications and has written two e-books on ethical sourcing issues: one for the consumer and one for the trade. He is a guest writer for the CSR Blog. He spearheaded publicity issues relating to the Greenland Ruby, campaigning on behalf of Inuit small scale miners. Jewelers That Care honored Choyt in 2010 for his global impact on ethical sourcing issues in the jewelry sector.
Choyt also spearheaded a three year volunteer cross sector project from the Madison Dialogue meeting in at the World Bank in Washington DC in 2011 to create the world’s first Fair Trade Jewelry Manufacturing Standards and Principles Document.
Policies of Reflective Images
Reflective Images is an early pioneer of ethical sourcing within the jewelry sector and its manufacturing practices reflect is proactive stance. The company has state of the art jewelry making equipment and ventilation. They recycle as much as they can in-house and use chemicals that are not damaging to the environment whenever possible. All packing material is either from shredded junk mail or it's recycled from what is received from our suppliers. The gold and silver the purchase for in house fabrication is entirely recycled. They pay extra for electricity which comes from wind and solar sources. Their main international supplier in Indonesia works on a fair trade basis.
Reflective Images has eight employees. Employees receive three weeks paid vacation, paid sick leave and several paid holidays. The company covers 50% of health insurance. Employees also receive bonuses based upon sales, and a "wellness" benefit, where the company matches up to $75 dollars a month that employees can use for anything from working out at the gym, to yoga, to meditation retreats. The entry wage for full time employees $15 an hour. All employees work on flex-time, which allows them to deal with family matters as they come up. Five employees have bought houses in Santa Fe while working for the company.
The company's mission statement is: "Reflective Images, Inc. is a profitable, creative and self-sustaining jewelry company that produces beautiful designs of consistently high quality in a timely fashion. We strive to be environmentally responsible. People employed here are invested in the company's success. They are valued for their contributions and for who they are. The business' profitability supports each employee's humanity, wholeness and desire to lead meaningful lives."
Awards and Recognition
Reflective Images, which has won several awards for excellence.
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