Recently I needed to haul some calves in my old pickup truck. I wanted to protect the bed but even more important I wanted to give the calves a cushion to stand on and a non-slip surface. The search for the right mat and what happened surprised me.

Here's the story.The deadline for getting the mat was only a few days away, not much time to order a mat and get it here in time. I checked the online sources first and the delivery time made it all but impossible to get the mat in time. So I tried calling around locally.Well, when I said my pickup was a 1976 Chevy, I got the funny little chuckles. What that meant was that all the pickup accessories places around here would have to order the mat as well and delivery was worse than what I expected from the sources I know of.

So it was time to look elsewhere.I headed for the nearest auto parts store. Same story at the first one. He could order it but delivery would take awhile. The other store close by was a different story.He got on the phone to a supplier who apparently stocks lots of mats. Yes, he could get me a mat by the next day. Yes, it was a custom fit for my truck. Now what about the price? It was $50... That was a nice round number but how could that be? I agreed, expecting that this was some kind of joke.But when I showed up the next day, sure enough, there it was and the price was indeed -- $50.

What I got was this big rolled up rubber mat which was far more mat than I would have thought you could get for such a low price.I went so far as to weigh the thing and it topped the scales at 68 pounds. This is one heavy duty piece of rubber composite material. Sure enough, it has cut-outs just to fit that particular bed. Fender well cut-outs are all but perfect and there are some other obvious custom cut-outs as well.

The truck bed mat includes dimples on the bottom which if nothing else make perfect drain channels for water. Then the upper surface has raised panels as well as ridges around the outside edges.Though it certainly looks like rubber, it surely has some fabric in the rubber. It has that corded look which suggests the thing probably would be all but impossible to tear. It will protect what's beneath it for sure.Installation is a major ordeal on some bed liners but not on rubber bed mats. The hardest part is lifting the heavy thing up into the bed.

After you get it hoisted into place, all you do is roll it out. It wants to lie flat, being thick and stiff. Once it's in place, Mat Supplier there's no worry about it blowing away or moving in the wind. It is too heavy for that.Rubber truck bed mats protect truck bed paint or even other more expensive liners. Providing tough protection for almost no cost, bed mats offer real value that's super simple to use and simple to install.

Author's Bio: 

I'm a writer; illustrator, columnist and an editorial fellow. My previous work includes roles in digital journalism and content writer. I did graduation in Journalism.