Last weekend, Karl Strauss showed its commitment to community and environment with their fourth annual beach clean-up in partnership with the Surfrider Foundation. 144 team members—from brewers to HR to sales—arrived at Crystal Pier in Pacific Beach early in the morning to begin cleaning up the beach and surrounding inland area.
“We are a local company operating in a beach city so it’s important for us to give back and do what we can to keep our oceans clean,” says Matt Rattner, President, Karl Strauss Brewing Company. “It was incredible to see so many team members volunteering to help out in such a meaningful way.”
Surfrider Foundation San Diego Chapter Manager, Haley Jain Haggerstone, was onsite to brief staff and reiterate Surfrider’s goal to protect and preserve the world’s oceans, waves, and beaches. “I was thrilled to organize a beach cleanup for the Karl Strauss team. Karl Strauss has been a big supporter of ours for years through the Beach to Brewery fundraiser, hosting our quarterly chapter meetings, and donating beer for our events. They collected an impressive amount of trash and helped make a big impact,” says Haggerstone.
Overall, the clean-up was a huge success with 278 pounds of trash (plus 53 pounds of recyclable materials, 3,755 cigarette butts, 1,017 miscellaneous plastics, 633 plastic food wrappers, 330 plastic bottle caps, and 281 plastic lids and straws) taken from the coast. Employees picked up more than 3,750 cigarette butts and 2,000 pieces of plastic—reiterating the importance of Surfrider’s “Hold On To Your Butt” and “Rise Above Plastics” campaigns.