Lets start with some sobering facts about plastic pollution:

  • Over 8 metric tons of plastic waste is dumped into our oceans every year! That's the equivalent to dumping the entire contents of a garbage truck directly into the ocean EVERY MINUTE!
  • The Great Pacific Garbage Patch in the Pacific Ocean between Hawaii & California contains an estimated 1.8 TRILLION PIECES OF PLASTIC and covers an area twice the size of the state of Texas.
  • More than 1,000,000 sea birds and over 100,000 marine mammals are killed by plastic pollution every year.
  • 80% of pollution that enters our oceans originates on land. For example, littering, sewage, agricultural runoff, toxic chemical runoff, etc.
  • At the rate we are going, by 2050, there will be more plastic in the ocean that fish.
  • In 2017, in the Gulf of Mexico, oceanographers detected a dead zone (an area of such low oxygen concentration in the water due to toxic pollution, that animal life suffocates and dies) nearly the size of New Jersey. This is the largest dead zone ever measured.
  • Plastic NEVER breaks down. Instead it breaks up into smaller and smaller pieces called Microplastics. These nasty microplastics have not only been a leading cause of death to marine animals, but have also been found in 83% of tested water samples from major metropolitan areas around the world. Yes, that means we are literally drinking plastic.


Because of these devastating realities, Our Mermaid Straw team is dedicated to doing everything we can to prevent as much pollution from entering our lakes, rivers and ultimate our oceans as possible!

Here is what we achieved last year:

2019 Cleanup Stats


Help us make this year even bigger and join us on June 27th from ANYWHERE in the world!


WHEN: Saturday, June 27th. 
WHERE: At your local park, beach, nature preserve, neighborhood, anywhere in your local community that needs help.

This Annual event gives you an opportunity to participate in our Mermaid Straw cleanups from anywhere in the world.Participating can be as simple as going for a walk around your neighborhood with your family and picking up any trash you see. Or for a bigger impact, you can get a group of your friends, coworkers, teammates, etc. together and do a cleanup at your local park, nature preserve or beach. 

If you are in the Northwest Indiana/Chicago/Southwest Michigan area, join the whole Mermaid Straw team and all our regular Mermaids at West Beach, IN on Lake Michigan for our cleanup event from 9am-11am.

Sign up below

When you register, you'll be asked to let us know your full name or the name of your organization, your email (so we can send you your confirmation of registration and some cleanup tips), the location of your cleanup(City, State & Country) and how many people will be participating with you. If you are coming to our Northwest Indiana Cleanup at West Beach, IN... Please also RSVP to our Facebook Event.

Help us get the word out

🌎 Invite your family, friends and followers and share this event on your social media pages. 

🌎 Tag @mermaidstraw 

🌎 Use the hashtags: #mermaidstraw #cleanourworld #mermaidstrawworldwidecleanup 

Our sole focus for this cleanup is to get as many people, companies & organizations to participate as possible all over the world so we can have the biggest impact possible.


By working together, we can help protect the future of our planet. 💙🌎  


Lisa & Adam 

Co-founders