The 2017 northern California wildfires hit The Hot Tub Store’s community particularly hard. One of the company’s founders lost his home, as did thousands of others. The company was compelled to help, donating $5,000 as well as 10 percent of hot tubs sales for a couple of weeks after the fire, raising $36,000.
The experience left the community grateful for what it had, and company president Sky Matula with a desire to do more to give back.
“We sponsored a running event that raised more than $16,000 for fire damaged trails in our local parks,” Matula says. “We are continuing to give huge discounts to our many hot tubbers who lost their homes and hot tubs in the fires.”
Despite its willingness to give back, Matula says it’s been more difficult than he imagined to find outlets that give enough of their donations back to those who have suffered. “It is hard to give when you can’t find truly good organizations to fund,” Matula says. “We keep finding organizations that give too much to their admin and not enough to the true cause.”
