There’s a well-known parable on the power of small actions about a boy throwing individual starfish back into the ocean. As the story goes, an old man questions the boy’s efforts saying he’ll never be able to save all of the starfish given the sheer length of the beach and amount of fish. The boy continues his work, throws another starfish back in the ocean, and replies to the man, “I made a difference for that one.”
It’s estimated that about nine million tons of plastic enter the ocean every year. That’s about a garbage truck full of plastic every minute. Thinking about the enormity of the task of trying to rectify this problem can feel overwhelming. But like the boy with a single starfish, SSA has set our sights on making a difference around single-use plastic where we can, one measure at a time. Here’s how we’re doing it.
One of our more recent efforts with our partner Monterey Bay Aquarium (MBA), involved transforming their gift shop to be 100% single-use plastic packaging free. This wasn’t an overnight achievement and our work together took several years but by identifying what items had single-use plastic wrapped around them, we started strategizing about how to replace those items.
We did this in small efforts, focusing on one product at a time and asked our vendors to find ways to eliminate single-use plastic in their packaging and in their range of products. From removing shrink wrap in puzzles to changing the eyeballs in stuffed animals from plastic to sewn-on, these small measures eventually turned into big results.
Today, Monterey Bay Aquarium’s gift shop is officially 100% single-use plastic packaging free. And we’re not stopping there. Here are some additional steps we’ve taken to remove single-use plastic and decrease our carbon footprint at other partner cultural attractions across the country.