Ferndale company cleans ocean trash through virtual greeting card sales

A devastating pandemic can have silver linings when it pushes people to try new things.

Greg Dayley and Annie Jenkins launched Trashy Greetings in November 2021, a business where the purchase of a $1 virtual greeting card equals one pound of picked-up ocean garbage.

It began in March 2020 when Dayley started picking up garbage in Whatcom County and his friend, Jenkins, did the same in Maine to stay active during quarantine. Dayley, a Ferndale resident, and Jenkins, a Maine resident, started picking up ocean trash for fun. When Jenkins’ friend in the Philippines said they wanted to help, a clean-up crew was organized across the world.

“It’s our ocean, too,” Dayley said. “It’s just the other side of us. I can get 20-30 pounds [of garbage picked up] in one hour. We hired a crew of six in the Philippines for a week and they picked up 30,000 pounds.”

After spending thousands of dollars of their own in cleanup efforts, Dayley and Jenkins brainstormed and founded Trashy Greetings as a way to fund future cleanups in both the Philippines and Whatcom County. Since they began, the company has picked up over 32,000 pounds of trash – far exceeding its initial cleanup goal of 1,000 pounds of trash, according to its website.

“Trashy Greetings is a fun way to raise money to clean up the ocean,” Dayley said. “It also eliminates greeting cards that are bad for the earth.”

Dayley said the company promotes zero waste but carries more gravity. He believes sending someone a greeting card by text is a great way to let them know someone is thinking of them.

Although Trashy Greetings is based in Ferndale, Dayley picks up garbage weekly in Birch Bay, Cherry Point, Bellingham Bay and on the Nooksack River.

When Dayley goes to Cherry Point, the majority of his cleanup is Styrofoam and buoys. Historic November 2021 floods cluttered the shore with fishing gear and garbage, Dayley said. “I picked up 50 pounds of Styrofoam in one day,” he said.

Dayley said there needs to be more done than recycling when reducing environmental impact.

“Right now about 95 percent go to the Philippines,” Dayley said of the company’s proceeds. “Here in Whatcom County we do it on a volunteer basis and the only real expenses [are finding] things like tires that we have to pay to dispose of.”

Eight million tons of garbage enter the ocean per year, according to Ocean Conservancy, a nonprofit environmental advocacy organization. About one percent of it floats, while everything else sinks. Although Dayley recognizes the statistic, he believes Trashy Greetings is a fun, tangible way to combat that one percent of ocean trash.

All of the greeting card profits go to clean up, 95 percent of which pay people in the Philippines to pick up trash, Dayley said.

“We find we can have a much bigger impact there,” he said. “Not only is there more trash in the ocean, but we can provide good jobs to those who might struggle to find well-paying employment otherwise.”

The virtual greeting card sales have gone up since the holidays, which is helping the newly launched company work toward its first goal: Hiring a full-time crew in the Philippines and acquiring one million pounds of trash in one year.

“I hope people will do what they can to reduce their impact,” Dayley said. “Instead of being a piece of tree, these greeting cards are a step up.”