Colorado non-profit started with local flood relief, expanded to major national projects

By Kristen Kuchar

Colorado-based Can’d Aid is celebrating its 10-year anniversary this month – along with building the 10,000th bike it will donate.

“It’s pretty amazing to think that 10,000 kids now have bikes and have that resource to get out and explore the world,” says Diana Ralston, Can’d Aid founder and executive director.

Can’d Aid anniversary celebration
Where: Oskar Blues Grill & Brew, 1624 Market St, Denver
When: 5 p.m.
Cost: Free from 5 to 7 for volunteer event. A $25 ticketed concert begins at 7.

This is part of the non-profit’s Treads + Trails program, just one of the many positive community initiates. With this program, volunteers help build bikes and skateboards to give to underserved youth to encourage kids to get outside and increase physical activity. The group also works to build, maintain and restore multi-use trails.

The organization was founded within the walls of Oskar Blues Brewery when Ralston was working as a sales representative. With prior professional experience in non-profits, she decided to pitch the idea of starting a non-profit organization that would also implement similar values to the craft beer industry – creativity, community and collaboration.

The organization’s first project was helping people, businesses and non-profits after the extensive 2013 flooding throughout Colorado’s Front Range.

From there, Can’d Aid worked to donate bikes, skateboards, musical instruments and art kits to children in need. Tune Ambassadors consist of individuals and bands that the organization helps with small artists grants to assist in their musical careers. Then these musicians assist with Can’d Aid efforts to enhance music programs within schools. The non-profit works directly with schools to understand what is needed to start or enhance a music program. Not only are new instruments and equipment donated, but the Tune Ambassadors reveal this with a musical assembly, Q&A and musical workshops. The group also teams up with professional athletes, including mountain bikers and skateboarders, to surprise schools with bikes and skateboards, which are built by volunteers.

The organization also supplies communities with clean drinking water, when unavailable, after fires, hurricanes and other disasters. More than three million cans of water have been donated throughout the U.S. and the Navajo Nation.

Another aspect of the group is sustainability efforts. This includes helping communities get started with recycling initiatives, cleaning up rivers and beaches, planting trees in eroded and deforested areas and working with various organizations to ensure healthy rivers, including American Rivers, the ColoradoWater Trust, RRAFT and Trout Unlimited. The organization estimates it has worked to recycle the equivalent of 72 million cans.

Volunteers are pivotal to Can’d Aid, Ralston explains, with most of the programs being fueled by people. But it's also the volunteers that benefit from the organization. As Ralston points out, people are able to come and work hand-in-hand with neighbors and new friends, and at the end of that time can actually see the fruits of their labor and recognize they did something good.

“It created this whole ripple effect of goodness and generosity,” she says.

The anniversary celebration will take place today at Oskar Blues Grill & Brew in Denver. The event kicks off with volunteers building bikes, skateboards and assembling art kits, which will be donated to youth in Denver (5 p.m. to 7 p.m., free). Then the ticketed event will begin with live music. Tickets are $25 and proceeds go toward the $20,000 goal.

For those choosing to become a monthly donor (a GEM, Gives Every Month), they are automatically entered into a sweepstakes that includes two round-trip flights to Colorado, three nights at Origin Hotel, two tickets to Tyler Childers + the Food Stamps at Red Rocks Amphitheater, a private guided fly fishing experience with Rocky Mountain Anglers and the ability to participate in Can’d Aid events.

Visit the event website to buy tickets, volunteer or learn how to donate. Visit candaid.org to learn more about the organization and sign up for the newsletter to hear about new volunteer opportunities.