Supergoop! Co-Owner Maria Sharapova and Founder & CEO Holly Thaggard Announce the Launch of Project Black Dot
Launching on the first day of fall, the new advocacy platform aims to raise year-round skin cancer awareness and call attention to current United States regulations on sunscreen use in schools
PR Newswire, NEW YORK, NY (September 23, 2015)
Globally renowned tennis champion and Supergoop! Co-Owner Maria Sharapova alongside Supergoop! Founder & CEO Holly Thaggard, are proud to announce the launch of Project Black Dot, a new education and activism platform with the singular mission to end the epidemic of skin cancer and improve skin health in America. Maria is the face and champion of this multidimensional platform that focuses on providing consumers with suncare education and activations year round, not just during the traditional “sun” months.
The Project Black Dot platform, which will unveil multiple initiatives throughout the coming year, will kick off today with “Project 1: Permission,” calling attention to current regulations on sunscreen in schools. This initiative will put the power into the hands of parents and schools by providing a simple, sunscreen permission slip which gives children the ability to use and apply sunscreen at school with the goal of obtaining 100,000 signed sunscreen permission slips.
“Each year there are more new cases of skin cancer than breast, prostate, lung and colon cancer combined…and yet, skin cancer is one of the most preventable of cancers,” says Thaggard, Supergoop! Founder & CEO. “While summer season and event based suncare is a practice that is on the rise, people are less engaged in every day, year-round suncare habits. It’s this incidental, unprotected exposure to UV rays over the course of a lifetime that creates much of the cumulative damage that leads to skin cancer. Our goal at Supergoop! is for sun protection to be as recognized as a healthy habit as the need for women to get mammograms or even more simply to teach your child to wear a seat belt or brush her teeth. With Project Black Dot, Maria and I are excited to share our passion and help ignite the important conversation about skin cancer prevention while providing simple, convenient tools to help Americans embrace healthy sun protection habits.”
Kicking off on September 23rd, (the first day of fall---a time that sunscreen is often put away for the “season”), this first project shines a much needed light on current regulations on sunscreen in schools. The Surgeon General recently declared skin cancer a national health concern and pointed to sunburns during childhood as a clear risk factor for skin cancer later in life. However, the FDA regulates sunscreen as an over the counter drug (OTC), and as a result, 47 states currently restrict public school children from openly carrying and applying sunscreen at school without a signed permission slip. As leading voices in the industry, Holly, Maria and the team at Supergoop! are calling on parents to sign their children’s permission slips and start the dialogue around sunscreen use in school. The goal of Project 1: Permission is to send 100,000 sun safe students to school with signed sunscreen permission slips.
“Since the age of 7, I have spent countless hours under the sun on a daily basis. Growing up at the tennis academy, sunscreen application was a necessity before I stepped onto the court. I assumed this healthy habit was one that most children in the US are exposed to, but through my involvement with Supergoop! this past year, I’ve quickly learned that this is just not the case,” says Sharapova. “Children experience nearly three times more UV exposure than adults, yet we are not supplying them with what they need to protect their skin at school. Through Project Black Dot and Project 1: Permission, I am excited to offer a new way for us to educate parents and policymakers across the country about the importance of teaching children safe sun practices, especially in their formative years.”
For more information, please visit: www.ProjectBlackDot.org
About Supergoop!
Launched in 2007 by suncare industry pioneer, Holly Thaggard, Supergoop! is the only prestige skincare brand completely dedicated to UV protection, innovations and research and development. Supergoop! is dedicated to delivering healthy, multifunctional suncare formulas free of controversial ingredients. With patents pending for new, highly technical and effective formulas, Supergoop! has earned distinction in the industry. Awarded the CEW INDIE Beauty Award as well as Allure’s Best of Beauty and Reader’s Choice awards, Supergoop! is at the forefront of new skincare product innovation. Supergoop! is currently available at Supergoop.com, Sephora/Sephora.com, Nordstrom/Nordstrom.com, Dillard’s, Birchbox.com on air at QVC and on qvc.com. For more information, please visit www.supergoop.com.
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