✓ The donations provide fresh water to residents affected by recent severe storms and flooding
✓ Molson Coors collaborated with multiple other businesses and its distributor partners to deliver these supplies, while also donating to local efforts through World Central Kitchen
✓ The donation marks nearly 3 million cans of water Molson Coors has donated to disaster relief initiatives since 2017
In the wake of the devastation caused by Hurricane Helene and Hurricane Milton, Molson Coors donated almost 280,000 cans of fresh water to help the residents living in Tampa and St. Petersburg, Florida; Kingsport, Tennessee; and Asheville and Hickory in North Carolina.
Molson Coors senior manager of community affairs Michael Nordman says that Molson Coors is able to use water from one of its breweries to collect clean drinking water for disaster relief efforts throughout the year.
“Our Trenton, Ohio brewery sits on a natural aquifer,” he says. “Every year, we shut down and clean one of our beer lines to produce high quality canned drinking water there to be used in times of emergency like right now, when residents across Florida, Tennessee, North Carolina and more are in dire need of fresh water.”
Nordman stressed that this was a group effort requiring cooperation between multiple companies.
Ball Corporation provided the cans, while Graphic Packaging International donated the 12-pack cartons. To provide help after Hurricane Helene, Molson Coors worked with two Wisconsin-based logistics companies, C.H. Robinson and Millis Transfer, to help get close to 190,000 cans of water from its Milwaukee and Shenandoah breweries to the local distributors. The shipping was particularly complicated because floods had destroyed many of the normal routes.
To help residents in need after Hurricane Milton, Molson Coors is sending 90,000 cans of water from its Milwaukee and Golden breweries to J. J. Taylor Companies, Inc.’s Fort Myers warehouse. From there, it will be distributed to those in need along Florida’s west coast, including Tampa and St. Petersburg.
“It really takes a village to get this together,” says Nordman.
Molson Coors also donated $10,000 to World Central Kitchen in Asheville. “They’ve been a leader on the ground to provide meals and water, which are most needed in that community right now.” says Nordman.
History of help
Molson Coors has a history of providing natural disaster relief. In 2017, Molson Coors established a partnership with the Ball Corporation. Since the partnership began, they’ve provided nearly three million cans of water to areas hit by natural disasters, like hurricanes, floods and wildfires.
Earlier this year, Molson Coors sent 50,000 cans of water to communities in northwest Iowa after heavy flooding.
“These are our communities and our neighbors, so where there is a need for canned water, we want to be able to respond quickly,” says Nordman.