The San Diego County Credit Union announced it set a new Guinness World Record for the most paper shredded in eight hours.
SDCCU, in partnership with Shred-It, iHeartMedia, Inc. and Live Well San Diego shredded 239,060 pounds of waste paper in an 8-hour period.
“We thank everyone who came out to the SDCCU Super Shred Event this past weekend and helped us achieve a new Guinness World Records title,” said SDCCU President and CEO Teresa Campbell. “SDCCU is pleased to not only achieve a new record, but to provide this much-needed, free service to the community. With a greater prevalence of fraud and identity theft in recent years, it is becoming more and more important to properly dispose of confidential, personal information. The first rule in preventing identity theft is, if you don’t need it, shred it.”
The SDCCU Super Shred Event began early June 15, with thousands of SDCCU customers, families, friends and members of the public lining up with boxes full of old documents containing personal and confidential information to be shredded at no charge. Shred-it® provided the shredding services. The first 1,000 people who took advantage of SDCCU’s free shredding services received a free gift. Throughout the day, more than $5,000 in donations were collected for SDCCU Stuff the Bus, a program launched in partnership with the San Diego County Office of Education and iHeartMedia radio stations, Star 94.1, Channel 93.3, JAM’N 95.7 and KOGO AM 600 benefiting the 22,000 plus homeless students in San Diego.
SDCCU began hosting its free Shred Day events in 2007 and has since collected, shredded and recycled more than 4.3 million pounds of documents at no charge, saving more than 37,000 trees (roughly 120 pounds shredded represents one saved tree). The events have also saved the community more than $475,000 in costs associated with shredding documents.