In 2010, I along with the world, watched in horror as the disaster of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig explosion unfolded. Over the following weeks my sense of helplessness and frustration about what was happening to the marine environment and the local communities impacted upon by this tragedy grew. And I knew I had to do something to make a difference.
For the previous ten years I, and my dive-buddy Rachel, had seen for ourselves a change in marine environments all over the world. Coral bleaching, less abundant fish, more rubbish on beaches and in the sea, polluted seawater and so on. It was becoming obvious that the sea was in trouble. We were no marine experts, just two people who loved the sea and felt privileged to be able to enjoy its beauty when we went diving. It was becoming hard to ignore the problems.
And then one day last year Rachel and I had an idea….the way that we could make a difference - our thinking went like this:
- No one has ever directly asked us to contribute to marine conservation or to give something back in return for the privilege of enjoying the sea and we love the sea and want to make a difference.
- Millions of other people who enjoy the sea (diving, sailing, surfing, going on boats) must have sometimes felt like we do and want to make a difference too.
- If we could harness that passion, which so many of us have for the oceans, it could make a real contribution to marine conservation.
And out of this thinking came a very simple idea…..
Imagine if there was a turnstile on the sea and every time anyone went diving, for a surf, sailing or on a cruise they were somehow asked to give a pound, a dollar or a euro as a kind of entry fee…..you could raise millions for marine conservation. It would also make the person enjoying the sea feel good, and lots of small contributions like that would make a huge difference to the amount of money available for marine conservation work.
Out of this grew the concept that eventually became Sea-Changers, a charity set up in May 2011 with the sole purpose of raising funds for marine conservation (www.sea-changers.org.uk). We haven’t quite set up a gigantic turnstile that anyone can see, but we are starting to create a slightly different variation on this basic idea. Our main fund-raising model is simple - we develop partnerships with retailers who are selling something to sea-users: a cruise holiday, a dive trip, a new piece of boat kit, a wetsuit. The retailer offers the customer the opportunity to make a small contribution to marine conservation when they are paying their bill. The donation is entirely optional. Other fund raising models we are developing include our text approach which will target sea-users more directly - after a great day on the beach or in the sea we want to encourage people to text their “turnstile” payment to us (Text SEAS10£1 to 70070).
It is early days for Sea-Changers. We are building relationships with other charities, membership organisations and most importantly with our future partners – the retailers. We started fundraising with our first retail partnerships which include a dive holiday company and a boat and boat supplies retailer. All our work is carried out on a voluntary basis and we have benefitted from the generosity of family, friends, colleagues who have contributed money, time, ideas and services to help get us started – it has been amazing and wonderful.
We think that Sea-Changers’ vision of raising money has huge potential and believe that those people who enjoy the sea would be prepared to make small contributions to say thank you for the enjoyment it gives them. And we also believe that retailers involved in our ‘opt out’ approach benefit from being seen as giving something back and being socially and environmentally responsible. They become a Sea-Changer...something to be proud of.
If you want more details about Sea-Changers or becoming a Sea-Changer business contact: info@sea-changers.org.uk
Sea-Changers Helen Webb and Rachel Lopata
Katrin and Mathew would like to thank Helen and Rachel for their great work and for their article and to encourage all our readers to check them out and the great work they do.
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