"Here’s to 20 more years of friendship, victories and perfect waves."
- Nik Strong-Cvetich, CEO of Save The Waves
- April 11, 2023
This year we are celebrating 20 years as an organization.
I myself have been here for the last 10 years and it’s amazing how the organization has grown and changed and morphed, but we’ve never lost that commitment to protecting surf ecosystems as the core of what we do.
And, for me, the biggest thing to celebrate of these 20 years is the sense of shared victory. Because we don’t do anything alone and our victories are dependent upon you and the relationships that we build.
That’s also the reason why I get up every day and do this job: it’s the amazing network that we have and the people that we work with day in and day out – whether you’re in the office, you’re on the board, you’re one of our key donors or you’re halfway across the world trying to protect your own surf ecosystem…
That is what is so meaningful to me: the amazing group of people that we pull together.
As I look forward to where we’re going, we still have this important mission of protecting surf ecosystems. We still have this big goal of protecting 1000 of them.
And it’s more timely than ever. We have climate change to contend with, and we want to continue to be a great partner for our Coalition members and look at the ways that we can improve to supercharge that goal and meet it together. What does that look like?
It means supporting our World Surfing Reserve Coalition partners with a new grant fund; Scaling up our surfing protected areas at the policy level in California, the Azores, the Maldives and more; it means ramping up our stewardship efforts to support our app users and partners with training, technical resources and finance; and continuing to support our partners fighting the good fight through our campaign support.
On this 20th anniversary, I ask you all not to join us, but to continue joining us and making the “us” better than it’s ever been.
So, thank you. Here’s to 20 more years of friendship, victories and perfect waves.
Nik Strong-Cvetich
CEO of Save The Waves Coalition