Earth Day Turns 50!

This year, Earth Day turns 50. While it will be hard for us to be out and about celebrating with friends and family by volunteering for litter pickups and neighborhood beautification projects, in many ways this Earth Day is a more meaningful one—almost as if Mother Nature were telling us to take a time out. Sheltering in place has had some incredible side effects. The canals of Venice are crystal clear. The Himalayas are visible in India for the first time in more than 30 years. Seashells are piling up by the thousands along Atlantic seashores with no tourists there to collect them. Coyotes are venturing onto the streets of San Francisco, while bears and other wildlife are enjoying Yosemite all to themselves. This year will give us a chance to think about the many ways the earth sustains us, and what we can do for it in return.

Earlier this year we were honored for our Cole Valley and Russian Hill stores to receive their Green Business recertifications from the San Francisco Department of the Environment. The awards ceremony was held in early March at the California Academy of Sciences—a perfect venue to fete the many green businesses of San Francisco. Cole Hardware president Rick Karp was the featured speaker. Congratulations to all of the merchants in San Francisco who go the extra mile to make their businesses green!

We’re proud to be the first green-certified hardware store in the country, and we look forward to hopefully starting up our many recycling programs in the near future.

Photos by Orange Photography