At The Beach Cares about The Center!

by Tanning Guy on 03/15/2012 | 0

What are you doing tonight?  Are you in Denver, Colorado?  At The Beach Cares hopes you are planning on attending the GLBT Community Center of Colorado’s 15th annual Jokers, Jewels & Justice benefiting The Center’s Legal & Advocacy Program.

Did you know that The Center’s Legal & Advocacy program is working to protect the civil rights of LGBT people and persons living with HIV/AIDS? At The Beach Cares knows!  If you are free then we invite you to an elegant evening of casino gaming that directly benefits The Center’s Legal & Advocacy Program.

Tickets are still available!!

$125  l  VIP includes valet parking, VIP reception, appetizers, and hosted Coors and Smirnoff beverages all evening

$75  l  Patron includes JJJ patron reception (gaming and silent auction) and 4 complimentary Coors or Smirnoff beverages

Thursday, March 15th
The Magnolia Hotel Denver, 818 17th Street

VIP Reception from 6-7pm
Valet parking and complimentary appetizers from the Magnolia and beverages by Coors and Smirnoff included!

honoring

Organization of the Year
the National Center for Lesbian Rights, received by Kate Kendell

Barrister of Year
Kyle Velte, Sturm College of Law
JJJ general patron reception 6.30pm-9pm
Featuring our exclusive and extensive silent auction and professionally run casino gaming tables!

Get out your gambling shoes…we plan to make the 2012 Jokers, Jewels & Justice the best LGBT legal event yet!

Our At The Beach Cares founder Brian Belt has generously donated a week-long stay in his palatial Palm Springs home as one of the items for the silent auction.  Last year this was one of the more popular bid items!

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At The Beach Tanning Receives National Breast Cancer Foundation’s Pink Circle Award

by Tanning Guy on 02/15/2012 | 1

WOW!  Look at this press release!

Englewood, Colo. (Feb. 14, 2012) – The National Breast Cancer Foundation, Inc.© (NBCF) has honored tanning superstore At the Beach with the prestigious Pink Circle Award. A longtime supporter of charitable causes, At the Beach raised $26,000 for breast cancer prevention last year through sales of a special pink t-shirt last October.

“As a company that serves thousands of women throughout the U.S., At the Beach is committed to its support of breast cancer prevention and awareness through sales of our special edition t-shirts,” said Candi Chappell, chief operating officer for At The Beach. “We are grateful to all of our tanners for their support of this project and honored by this wonderful award from NBCF. It is our hope that through efforts such as this, more women receive the education and screening necessary to halt the spread of this disease.”

Coordinated by Chappell and At the Beach’s Vice President for Corporate Development, Judson Kinkade, the breast cancer awareness fundraising project sold more than 1,400 t-shirts in stores throughout Denver; Orange County, Calif.; Oklahoma City; Tulsa, Okla.; and Wichita, Kansas. Designed with a nod to its quirky advertising, At the Beach’s limited edition pink breast cancer awareness t-shirt featured one of the company’s eccentric characters, Donatella, with the phrase “Saving the beach’s most precious resource.” The in-store fundraising efforts were supported by a special blog, At the Beach Cares (www.atthebeachcares.com), which is devoted to the company’s charitable efforts on behalf of a wide-range of causes.

“We are proud to partner with At the Beach,” says NBCF Director of Fundraising, Jeff Neal.  “Their fundraising efforts have raised over $26,000, and these funds will help NBCF provide much needed mammograms and breast cancer services for women that could not otherwise afford them.”

About the National Breast Cancer Foundation, Inc.(R)

Recognized as one of the leading breast cancer organizations in the world, the National Breast Cancer Foundation, Inc.’s (NBCF) mission is to save lives through early detection and to provide mammograms for those in need.  NBCF provides women help for today and hope for tomorrow through its National Mammography Program, Beyond The Shock®, Early Detection Plan, MyNBCF online support community, and breast cancer research programs. For more information, please visit www.nbcf.org.

About At the Beach

Founded in 1987, At the Beach is a regional tanning salon chain with over 60 stores located throughout California, Colorado, Kansas and Oklahoma. At the Beach is involved in multiple charities and causes, such as the National Breast Cancer Foundation, Project Angel Heart and the Colorado AIDS Project. Additionally, they foster support through their blog, atthebeachcares.com, and provide information at their locations. For more information about At the Beach, please check out http://atbtanning.com.

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Profile in Caring – Howard Hendrick

by Tanning Guy on 01/24/2012 | 0

Did you know that it is the mission of the Oklahoma Department of Human Services to help individuals and families in need help themselves lead safer, healthier, more independent and productive lives?  At The Beach Cares knows!  The At The Beach Cares team is proud of the work this organization does and considers our involvement with this organization through events like the Foster Kid appreciation event a special blessing for At The Beach Cares and At The Beach Tanning superstores.

OKDHS Director Howard Hendrick announced his retirement plans today after 13 and half years in that position.  During his tenure so many things changed, for the better, from the stars childcare accreditation program, to partnerships with food banks to address hunger issues, to work creating swift adoptions.  Did you know that 160,000 children have been adopted in Oklahoma while Mr. Hendrick has been Director of OKDHS?  At The Beach Cares knows and is impressed with his hard work.

In an email he sent to the entire OKDHS today Mr. Hendrick included the following heartfelt thanks “I am extremely grateful for the privilege I have been given to lead OKDHS.  I need to thank all of the wonderful Commissioners who have served over the last 13 and half years.  You were paid nothing and spent hundreds of hours of public service each at significant personal and professional expense.  Thank you.  I love you and have so enjoyed our time together.
To the dozens of officers and executives who make this organization work, I will have extremely fond memories of 90 day reviews, executive team meetings, Christmas lunches, conference presentations, budget meetings and the “drop in” visits we have had with each other.  I will remember the times we played at the state games, laughed together, prayed together and the solemnness of attending a memorial service for a fellow worker or friend.  Thank you.  You have made my life rich and I am forever grateful.
I owe a special thanks to Cheryl Willie, my personal assistant of more than 20 years.  Cheryl was my assistant at the Senate before coming to OKDHS.  She retired from OKDHS last year.  We have laughed through weddings and ball games and cried through the pains of parenting and family losses.  When either of us cry, the other tastes the salt.  Everyone should have a few “perfect friends.”

To my family, I simply say thanks.  It does not take long to live a lifetime.  I remember a reception to which I brought my family when I first came to the Department.  Hudson was four years old.  Today, he’s a senior in high school.  My oldest daughter was in high school, playing highly competitive softball – which she did throughout college.  Today, she’s the mother of my three grandchildren.  The middle girls were in elementary school.  Today, they are both in college – one at OU, where I went to graduate school and one at OSU (my orange and black sheep).  To my wife, Tracy, thank you for letting me be late to dinner and understanding when I needed to leave town.  I’ll try to get the yard fixed better this year.  I love you and thank you for being a great mom to our children.”

At The Beach Cares is moved by this sincere statement of gratitude.

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Getting to Zero

by Tanning Guy on 12/02/2011 | 0

Worlds Aids Day

Red Ribbon

Red Ribbon

Did you know yesterday, December 1st was Worlds AIDS Day? At The Beach Cares knows!   This event was first observed in 1988, and began as a way to increase awareness of the disease and support those affected by it, their families, their communities, even entire countries.  It provided an opportunity to fight prejudice against people living with HIV, improve knowledge about the disease among the wider population, and raise money for research.

World AIDS Day is the brainchild of WHO, the World Health Organization.  This year’s theme is “Getting to Zero” which means Zero new HIV infections AND Zero Discrimination and Zero AIDS related deaths.  These are lofty goals, but At The Beach Cares believes they can be achieved.

For many adults in their 30’s and 40’s Pedro Zamora of MTV’s Real World was the first ‘real person’ with AIDS that we encountered.  His spirit and positive attitude put a real face on this scary disease.  Many of us on the At The Beach Cares team remember watching his story unfold.  Sites like this and this commemorate and honor him.

We’ve come a long way since then.  A Diagnosis of HIV/AIDS is no longer the death sentence that it used to be, provided you have access to medical treatment.  Statistics say that over 6 million people in the developing world are now receiving lifesaving antiretroviral treatment. In Africa, the world’s hardest-hit region, over 3 million people are receiving treatment with support from the U.S. President’s Emergency Program for AIDS Relief, or PEPFAR.  And the number of new infections each year around the world has dropped by approximately 25 percent over the past decade.  At The Beach Cares encourages everyone to support the goal of Getting to Zero.

For more information about World AIDS Day you can look at these sites here and here.  The Huffington Post and the World Aids Campaign also have good articles about the World AIDS Day.

If you are in Denver, this Sunday is Denver’s Red Ball for World Aids Day, and At The Beach Cares is one of the official sponsors for that event.

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At The Beach cares about the environment

by Tanning Guy on 11/17/2011 | 18

“At The Beach replaces our bulbs at 500hours, half the life of the bulbs so that you are always tanning on fresh bulbs!” Almost any customer who has visited our stores has heard this truth about tanning in our tanning beds.  Did you ever stop to think about how many bulbs are in a bed, times the number of beds in a store, times the number of stores we have?  Do you know what happens with all those bulbs once we replace them?  At The Beach Cares knows.

Did you know that tanning bulbs contain mercury, a metallic element that can accumulate in living tissue and cause adverse health effects in sufficient concentrations?  At The Beach Cares knows.  While this element is just as safe in tanning bulbs as it is in the florescent bulbs you use in your homes, when a lamp is broken, crushed or dispensed in a landfill or an incinerator, there is the possibility that the hazardous element may be released into the air, surface water or groundwater.

Now, just like with the light bulbs in your homes, some communities have recycling facilities or disposal processes to properly dispose of this type of bulb.  The problem is that not all communities or facilities are equipped to dispose of bulbs the size of tanning bulbs, or in the large quantities that At The Beach accumulates.  Which is why At The Beach has recycled and or disposed of our used tanning bulbs in a partnership with Sun Ergoline, our bed/bulb manufacturers.  This relationship has been going on for years.  Recycling the bulbs ensures that none of the harmful mercury winds up where it can affect the environment and it also helps reduce the waste that winds up in landfills.  At The Beach Cares is trying to reduce the negative impact the used bulbs can have on the environment.

The one aspect of our bulb recycling program that At The Beach Cares has been less than happy about is that in order to recycle the bulbs with Ergoline, all the bulbs in all the markets have to be shipped to the Ergoline facility in Arkansas.  So that even though we are doing the right thing with the recycling, there is a definite environmental cost because of the shipping and the carbon footprint for the delivery trucks.

For this very reason, At The Beach Cares is excited about the next step in this process.  Very soon our partners at Sun Ergoline will be supplying At The Beach Cares with our own equipment that will allow us to destroy the used bulbs safety onsite, and then we will work with local recycling and disposal services to handle the “bulb remains” without the issues we mentioned before with the size of the bulbs.

At The Beach Cares feels that this is a step in the right direction and shows out commitment to the environment.

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Profile in Caring – Dan Rohn

by Tanning Guy on 09/21/2011 | 0

At The Beach Cares about Kids.  Recently an incident occurred at one of our stores that brought some newsworthy attention on our District Manager Dan Rohn.

During the final days of August a customer left her one year old child locked in her car while she came in to use our store.  The employees at the store were not aware the baby was left in the car, and had no indication that anything was amiss until another customer brought it to their attention.

Thinking on his feet, Dan verified the baby was indeed in the car then called 911.  He also shut off the tanning bed to get the customer out of the bed and back to her child.  The police indicated that when they arrived the temperature in the car was upwards of 100 degrees.  Luckily the child was fine.

Dan is a father himself and when faced with that situation he took immediate action.  At The Beach Cares applauds Dan’s quick thinking and is proud that he is part of our At The Beach Cares Team.

When the local news heard about this they came out to interview Dan.  You can check out the channel 4 interview here, and the article in the Denver post here.

At The Beach Cares is very thankful that the child was ok, and that things worked out the way they did.

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