My son was at times a so-called “spit-up infant”. Let’s just say his cotton crawling mat was often stained... On top of this, we have a cat who also liked the blanket, so the blanket was more in the washing machine than on the floor - not exactly environmentally friendly. And, when the mat was actually on the floor, my son tried crawling, but unfortunately it didn't work as crawling mats are usually not non-slip. This of course annoyed him. All this meant that my first prototype was an embroidered cork mat. I put it through its paces in the bathroom. As a mum, you take your child everywhere with you; in the bathroom, he lay on the cork mat and of course he threw up as usual - but one wipe and everything was gone!
Then I started to think about it more intensively. I realised that cork perfect for children in various other ways - it stays flat on the floor when they try to crawl, and doesn't fluff either, plus bacteria don't stand a chance with cork. This makes it more or less perfect - no other material can offer this many advantages.