Launched in June 2020, our Diversity, Equity and Inclusion program is open to all staff members at Humble Sea. We meet every 4-6 weeks to share our internal goals surrounding diversity and inclusion at the brewery as well as openly discuss broader topics that affect inclusivity across the beer industry. 

The objectives of our DE&I program are:

• To continue to foster a workforce that has a variety of perspectives, experiences, backgrounds, and is representative of the diverse communities that exist both locally in Santa Cruz and within the Bay Area
• To create inclusive training and implement tools that support, inspire and engage staff
• To provide a safe and supportive environment for all members to work, learn, and thrive
• To conduct regular, anonymous surveys to understand how our employees feel about the company culture and environment 
• To identify and address emerging issues that can impact our diversity culture
• To host speakers that share and educate all staff on topics surrounding diversity and inclusion 

Creating a safe, diverse, and awesome workplace is our primary goal. We are learning as we go and are always open to feedback. 

On top of our internal DE&I program, we also members of the Bay Area Brewers Guild’s Diversity, Equity and Inclusion group to learn from and share resources with some of the Bay’s leading breweries.

Want to speak at a future DE&I meeting? Awesome! We’d love to have you! Please shoot us an email at info@humblesea.com

Each year since our founding, we’ve set aside an annual budget for giving.

This year, our budget for giving is $30,000 in cash donations and $15,000 in product donations. We give to organizations that advance diversity, equity and inclusion as well as those that support social justice movements and/or environmental stewardship.

In 2021 thus far, our four largest donations have totaled $14,623 combined and were given to the below organizations:

APEDF (African People’s Education & Defense Fund, associated with Uhuru Foods & Pies) - $5,000

AAPI Women Lead (Our donation as part of the Bay Area Day of Action) - $2,839

Santa Cruz Mountain Trails Stewardship - $5,000

Stachestong - $1,784

Being fully transparent (which is our jam), brewing beer isn’t the most sustainable activity on earth. In fact, manufacturing in general is not the most sustainable concept — think about it, you make stuff, then sell it. The earth probably doesn’t need more stuff. 

That being said, we absolutely love crafting the most delicious beer we possibly can, and we prefer to create a product that fuels experiences, rather than a single use throw away product. Considering we can’t fall in love with making beer, we’ve been searching for ways to make our craft as sustainable as we possibly can afford. 

What we’re doing:

• Beach Cleanups - Our staff organizes local volunteers to clean up our local Santa Cruz beaches
• Paper fourpack holders - This is huge for us. We’ve canned more than 1 million cans in the past year, think about how much unnecessary waste we’d create if our fourpack holders were plastic!
• Reducing water use where we can. Brewing is a water-intensive process, but there are ways to be more responsible about the process. We choose not to reverse osmosis our water due to how wasteful that procedure can be. Instead, we filter and treat our water to achieve the profile we're looking for. 
• We put most of our beer in cans because 1) it’s better for the beer and 2) aluminum is the most sustainable material we’ve found to house our beer. 
  
  Facts about aluminum:
  The average aluminum can contains over 70% recycled material, the average plastic bottle contains only 3%.
  
  Aluminum is infinitely recyclable. Plastic is not. In fact, plastic is not even technically recyclable anymore because it is no longer profitable to recycle. So most recycling facilities simply send plastic to landfills because they would go out of business trying to recycle it. Environmental economists now say it is actually better for the planet to simply throw your plastic in the trash so that it requires less trucking to get it to the landfill. Sad stuff.
  
  Of all the aluminum produced since 1888, over 75% of it is still in current use.
  
  If plastic production isn’t curbed, plastic pollution will outweigh fish pound for pound by 2050.