WAKE

Remember when they taught you Earth was 75% water? Well, it was only kind of true. Water does make up 75% of the surface of our planet. But if you gathered up all of the water on Earth, from the oceans, rivers, lakes, deep in the ground and up in the clouds, every last drop, it would only be the size of that big, blue dot over North America. See the smaller dot beside it? That's all of the fresh water on Earth. And that teeny, tiny dot over about Georgia? Look again. There it is. That's all of the fresh water we can actually access. On the whole planet. For luxuries, like, say, drinking.

Sadly, the water on our planet is in huge trouble and getting much worse at an alarming rate.

One problem is that plastic now swirls in the Pacific Ocean, gathered into a garbage patch the size of Texas, nine stories deep. That plastic wasn't even invented until 1957. It's in fish and wild birds, and a recent study shows bits of plastic are now in 94% of the world's table salt.

In 1950, we were only fishing 1% of the high seas. Today, about 63% is commercially fished and over 87% of fish species are now considered exploited, overexploited or collapsed to levels nearing certain extinction. Many of them are discarded at sea as undesired, dead bycatch.

Even crazier is what's going on with phytoplankton. Phytoplankton's responsible for removing the majority of the world's excess carbon, more than the rain forests and all other terrestrial systems combined. These tiny organisms also supply over half of Earth's oxygen. Unfortunately, rapidly increasing ph levels, caused by carbon pollution, are now killing them off. The Indian Ocean's phytoplankton has been reduced by over 30% just since the year 2000, and the other oceans are steadily following this same path.

Whoa. Nuts, right? That's a lot to try to correct. Governments and grass roots efforts have barely been able to scratch the surface. So what can we do? Well, here's an idea for a way to start: Oysters.

They're nature's natural filters. One oyster can filter 55 gallons of water per day. Guess what? We've overfished them, too. Down to less than 1% of their historic levels. Can we put them back? Yes. But let's be honest here, do we really think enough people will want to go out and get all mucky and fish smelly seeding oysters? Nope. Luckily, they don't have to. They just need to do things they already enjoy doing a lot, like buying a new shirt they'd love to wear to a party this Friday, or ordering a sweet, handmade kitchen knife. Maybe grab some great whiskey glasses for their bar, go on an outdoor adventure trip down the Chesapeake or join in on a ridiculously delicious foodie expedition.

source: water.usgs.gov/edu/earthhowmuch.html

WAKE is a lifestyle brand with everything from fresh fashions to fun finds that make entertaining easy. It's adventures on the water and incredible dining experiences. Profits go directly to seeding oysters back into the sea. People just have to do what they already love to do and care enough to fly the WAKE logo, so other people learn how they can help, too. The money they spend will start healing our oceans immediately. This idea doesn't require massive, social change to begin being effective. Recovery grows with every oyster that goes into the water.

WAKE is about realizing what we're leaving in our wake and waking up to start fixing the problem now. In stunning style.