When longtime San Francisco friends Jessica Everett and Suzanne Navarro decided to partner in Ester’s New Prospect, a tropical rum bar they opened on Wailuku’s Main Street in August 2020, they knew that they wanted to do something to contribute to the community. So, four times in the past year and a half, the two have developed specialty cocktails for their menu and donated all proceeds from the fancy drinks to a nonprofit charity. “They blew me away,” said Campbell Farrell, founder and director of Love the Sea, a group dedicated to cleaning up debris on shorelines and beaches in Hawaiʻi–and the bar’s latest beneficiary. He expected a contribution of a few hundred bucks when the women offered to do a fundraiser for his group, so he was impressed when the donation totaled $2,500.
“It’s really cool,” said Farrell. “It makes you realize what a difference establishments like this can make when they make the effort.” Love the Sea’s most recent cleanup project last fall removed 5,700 pounds of debris from the Maui coastline stretching from Waiheʻe to Kahakuloa. Farrell’s goal is to collect 100,000 pounds of beach debris in 2022. Other groups who have benefitted from the bar’s generosity include the Special Olympics, the Hawaiʻi Animal Rescue Foundation, and Women Helping Women.
