Sunday, February 2nd, 2025

Pouring It Forward: Tacoma Beer Week with Drinking For Conservation

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Pour it forward for polar bears on Saturday, March 1, the opening day for Tacoma Beer Week, for the 10th annual Party for Polar Bears in Tacoma’s Proctor District.

Pouring It Forward: Tacoma Beer Week with Drinking For Conservation

Polar bears, the first species to be declared threatened or endangered because of climate change, rely on sea ice for hunting seals and raising their young. Climate models project that rising temperatures will continue diminishing sea ice throughout this century. In other words, polar bears are listed as threatened in the US under the Endangered Species Act in May 2008.

This alarming news is undoubtedly the polar opposite of what you expected to read attached to the 2025 Tacoma Beer Week. Would it make more sense if you learned there’s a beer party planned to save polar bears?

Pour it forward to Saturday, March 1, the opening day for Tacoma Beer Week; the 10th annual Party for Polar Bears will be held in Tacoma’s Proctor District. The 2025 Proctor Polar Bear Crawl begins in the afternoon with shopping and treats at participating Proctor businesses, followed by a nighttime fundraising party featuring the Party for Polar Bears organization, Point Defiance Chapter of the American Association of Zookeepers, and Drinking for Conservation with 7 Seas Brewing at Peaks & Pints.

In 2015, now-retired polar bear keeper Cindy Roberts launched Party for Polar Bears! after she was chosen to attend the 2015 Climate Alliance with Polar Bears International and subsequent exploration to Churchill, Manitoba, the world’s polar bear capital. Her observation of wild polar bears inspired her to educate zoo visitors and communities on protecting polar bears and their habitats.

Roberts took her passion for polar bears and partnered with the Point Defiance Chapter of the American Association of Zookeepers and Drinking for Conservation to organize the annual Party for Polar Bears! around International Polar Bear Day on Feb. 27.

Since its founding, Party for Polar Bears! has raised more than $53,000 in the last nine years, all proceeds going to polar bear conservation.

Cindy returned to Churchill, Manitoba, as a field ambassador with Polar Bears International in 2019 and 2022. In October 2022, she was awarded the Nico van Strien Leadership In Conservation award for her efforts with the annual fundraiser and polar bear conservation.

Suzanne Akerman, staff biologist at Point Defiance Zoo & Aquarium and co-chair of Drinking For Conservation, hosted Kegs For Keepers at the Parkway Tavern in 2015.

Drinking For Conservation

Peaks & Pints supported Drinking for Conservation before opening on November 1, 2016. Peaks co-owner Ron Swarner attended their fundraising efforts at Pierce County beer bars, helping Suzanne Akerman, staff biologist at Point Defiance Zoo & Aquarium and co-chair of DFC, raise money for endangered species through benefit nights. Like Roberts, Akerman has spent many sleepless nights pondering the plight of endangered species.

DFC donates to organizations with missions the committee believes in — helping animals and the environment. Then, Akerman and her fellow animal people find extraordinary organizations with big hearts, such as Peaks & Pints, Parkway Tavern, and Doyle’s Public House, to donate to the cause, let them roam through the establishment to chat up conservation, and in Akerman’s case, dress like the spotlight animal and, if need be, arm wrestle brewery salespeople for extra donations. DFC has promoted Libations for Lions, Sloshed for Seahorses, Buzzed for Bees, and Brews for Bats, where Akerman wore bat wings.

That’s how DFC thinks.

They drink to help animals.

They drink to help polar bears.

You’ll obviously drink to that.

So will 7 Seas Brewing, Pierce County’s longtime nautical-themed brewery, with a huge heart. The brewery along Gig Harbor’s waterfront and Tacoma’s Historic Brewery District will anchor on Peaks & Pints’ Western redcedar tap log during the Party For Polar Bears, showcasing its spectrum of delicious beers.

7 Seas Brewing owners Mike Runion, left, and Travis Guterson celebrate their third anniversary in the old Gig Harbor spot in July 2012.

Founders Mike Runion and Travis Guterson opened 7 Seas Brewing in 2008. Still, a fire in January 2009 at the original downtown Gig Harbor address meant the two young beer makers and co-owners had to relocate to a woodsy area close to The Inn at Gig Harbor. Popularity and growth forced them to move to a larger location back in downtown Gig Harbor to the 11,000 sq. ft. former QFC grocery store with an 8,600 sq. ft. production facility and 2,400 sq. ft. taproom with long tables and outdoor seating in Gig Harbor AND an 80,000-square-foot expansive taproom, marketplace, and production facility with 10,000 sq. ft. basement for barrel program in Tacoma’s Historic Brewery District at a site that once held part of the Heidelberg Brewery. Along the way, Runion and Guterson managed to be the first brewery in Washington to can craft beer, won “Best Brewery in the South Sound” 11 years running by readers of South Sound Magazine, and “Best Brewery in Tacoma” by the Weekly Volcano, and their Tacoma location has become a community hub for meetings and celebrations.

In 2023, Runion and Guterson opened a new, gorgeous 6,000-square-foot taproom along Gig Harbor’s waterfront on Harborview Drive.

Join 7 Seas, Drinking for Conservation, and Party For Polar Bears! on the 2025 Tacoma Beer Week opening day, saluting polar bears and beers from 6 to 9 p.m. Saturday, March 1. Peaks & Pints will donate 50 cents for each draught ale purchased to help save polar bears.

A map for participating Proctor Polar Bear Crawl businesses can be found at the Party For Polar Bears Crawl, where more details and updates about entertainment and participating businesses are also available.

LINK: Peaks & Pints beer and cider cooler inventory