Worldwide models, athletes participate in lake cleanup
Lake Santeetlah – Go to Malibu Boats’ website (malibuboats.com) and if the backdrops for its promotional photos and videos look familiar, they should.
The company comes to Lake Santeetlah for two weeks each year to shoot promotional video and photos for its latest lineup of high-end, peak-performance ski boats.
And one day each year, the entourage of company officials, sponsored professional athletes (wake surfers and wakeboarders) and models take the pricey boats onto the lake – to collect trash.
One boat used during the litter pickup was Malibu’s top-of-the-line M240, a 24 1/2-footer that will cost you well over $300,000 new.
This year’s take, collected over about two hours on May 18, included three tires, a 55-gallon drum, a brand-new soccer ball, bags and bags of assorted litter — and a thousand-dollar surfboard of theirs that had been blown away during a storm earlier that week.
This year’s visit started May 14 and ended Wednesday. This is Malibu Boats’ 10th year at Lake Santeetlah, regarded as one of the most beautiful lakes in the nation, and their one-day litter cleanup has been taking place for about seven years.
“We want to give back to the community that hosts us,” said Bryant Thomas of Malibu Boats.
Malibu Boats has more than 700 employees who build Malibu and Axis Wake Research boats in three manufacturing facilities in Merced, Calif., Loudon, Tenn., and New South Wales, Australia.
The crew at Lake Santeetlah is based in Tennessee, but members came from around the world, including Italy, the United Kingdom, Canada, and several U.S. locations.
They base their Lake Santeetlah operation at Blue Waters Mountain Lodge off Pine Ridge Road, where a small marina offers easy access for their boats.
Lake Santeetlah, which is within a day’s drive of the company’s Tennessee plant, does more than offer a nearby setting.
Ronnie Hanline, senior creative manager at Malibu Boats, said the lake offers pristine waters, vivid blue skies, dramatic mountain backdrops, and miles and miles of undeveloped shoreline that provide dramatic scenery for Malibu Boats marketing materials.
Hanline said the annual trips to the lake include up to 40 people who are well received during their stay.
The company has been known to travel to Florida and out west for similar photo shoots when those settings are necessary, but, generally speaking, their go-to location is Lake Santeetlah.