Molly Pekarik

As you know, we’re spending a week on the river. But we haven’t ‘gone fishing’ – at least not in the traditional sense. During our signature volunteer event, we ‘fish’ for trash in our local Winooski River. Our ‘big catches’ are bottles and cans, tractor tires, or old signs.. We know how important clean water is to our world and to our cherished cups of specialty coffee, so for the past eight years we have volunteered hours and energy to maintaining water health in our own backyard.

This is my second year in a row participating in River Cleanup, and I couldn’t be more thrilled about some of the litter we’ve managed to clean out of the river already. Last year, the ‘catch’ I was most excited about, the story I recalled over and over to my friends and colleagues, was the ancient laptop we’d pulled from the bank – it didn’t even have a full screen! This year has already topped that ‘catch’ by far. Just this morning my volunteer group dug two shopping carts out of the river. Talk about cleanup in Aisle Three...

Our crew wasn’t afraid to get down and dirty for the cause, either. Our volunteers come from every department in our company, from the manufacturing plant to the high-tech coffee lab, and everyone worked together and put in a tremendous effort. Catching those two shopping carts (along with over a hundred tires, and bucketful’s of trash) was hard work, but completely rewarding. And while I don’t have a fish story to share for my time on the river, I think my catch of the day might be even more special.