What should you give someone seventy years old? Marcel and thirteen friends knew what to do with it. The birthday boy asked for beer caps for charity, and he was able to get them. The group collected beer caps throughout the country, no less than thirty cubic meters in total. Saturday they dropped the caps in front of the birthday boy’s house. “We’ve calculated it, it’s about six million.”
“It actually started by Jac himself”, begins Marcel, a good friend and initiator. Jac collects beer caps for the Diabetes Fund. He preferred to have the container in front of his house, where people can hand in the caps, completely full. “So he asked for beer caps for his birthday,” explains Marcel, “so that he can hand in the caps with his daughter – who has diabetes herself.”
“We open those bins and then everything clatters on the ground”
He knew that. Jac might have been expecting a few bags with caps from the guests at his party. He hadn’t expected two quads and two tractors with dumpers full of caps.
The quads have a symbolic meaning. “We know each other from the quad club”, Marcel says before the stunt. Then they drive with six million caps to the birthday boy’s house, down the street. “We open those bins in front of his door and everything clatters on the ground,” he says enthusiastically.
“Tin and metal is separated and that yields money”
The Diabetes Fund started the campaign years ago and now caps are being saved all over the country. In almost every city there is a point where these caps can be returned. For Tilburg, Jac’s house is the return address.
“The caps are then taken to the detinning factory in Leeuwarden,” explains Marcel. “There the tin is separated from the metal and that generates money that ends up at the Diabetes Fund.” The Fund invests that money in scientific research.
“Obviously, the builders liked one while building, so we were allowed to take everything with us.”
Without his knowledge, Jac’s friends called the foundation and drove all over the country to pick up the beer caps at the various collection points. Everyone has contributed, says Marcel. “I made the contacts. Others, who have tractors, have gone to get the caps.”
In Zundert, the group found a mountain of Jupiler caps: “Of course the flower parade had just ended there. Of course, the builders wanted one while building, so we were allowed to take everything with us.”
“You wanted to cap, didn’t you?”
While the visitors walk into Jac’s house, three hundred meters away the procession with the caps leaves for the birthday boy or girl. Marcel congratulates him on his birthday and gives him a bottle filled with caps. “You wanted to cap, didn’t you?” he asks Jac, “Is this enough?” Jack shakes his head. “Come outside with me then”, Marcel calls out.
Soon the first cars full of caps arrive, to the delight of Jac. Marcel later says: “First came the quads, but Jac joked that it wasn’t enough. Then came the two huge containers that threw all the caps on the floor. It was amazing!”
Fortunately, Jac himself was just as enthusiastic: “Great!”, he laughs above the buzz of the party. But is it enough? “Of course there is always more to come,” he laughs.
“Cleaning up tomorrow is so done”
The birthday boy is now with about six million caps at the door, but he is not really worried about it. “Clean up tomorrow,” he says. “But that’s how it happened.” Marcel adds that Jac owns a company with excavators and containers. “So he can boast most of it himself. We’ll come and help him tomorrow with the last bits. Then we immediately help to drink the last beers”, jokes Marcel.
With the campaign, the group of friends wants to draw attention to charity. “Almost everyone has beer caps, but not everyone knows that they can raise money for a good cause,” says Marcel. “Or that you can hand them in at collection points throughout the country, for example at Jac in Tilburg”.
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