A new safety standard for beach umbrellas went into effect in April, and for one beach umbrella manufacturer the new development is 15 years in the making.
In 2009, Bill Schermerhorn witnessed a terrible accident while relaxing on a beach that changed the course of his career.
“My wife and I were relaxing on a beach in 2009 and we witnessed a horrendous accident where an umbrella hit a 7-year-old girl in the face,” he recalls. “It was horrific. Even as things started to calm down, we still noticed umbrellas flipping around on the beach. I mainly thought there’s got to be something to prevent this from happening.”
Schermerhorn spent the next year trying to find a solution to prevent beach umbrellas from flying away. He notes that most people simply stick their beach umbrella poles into the sand, rock them back and forth and tilt them.
“That approach doesn’t prevent anything from lifting up out of the sand,” he says.
In 2011, Schermerhorn invented and patented BeachBub Ultra beach umbrella base as a way to keep umbrellas secure at beaches, resorts and other sandy locations. The BeachBub has a foldable base that can be filled with sand to secure umbrellas in place. He says the umbrella went to market in 2015 and was embraced by facility managers at some resorts and municipalities for their beaches.
But Schermerhorn wanted to do more than simply offer a safer beach umbrella option. He says he wanted to work to eliminate the problem altogether, noting that roughly 3,000 people go to the hospital each year with beach umbrella-related injuries.
To further prevent umbrellas from flying away at beaches, Schermerhorn formed a coalition and lobbied to lawmakers in Washington involved with the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) to update the standards for beach umbrellas. In 2021, he says lawmakers reached out to the American Society for Testing & Materials (ASTM) and CPSC to release a formal beach umbrella safety standard. Schermerhorn says he joined the ASTM committee to help make this standard. The committee also included engineers from CPSC who helped to perform field, wind tunnel and lab tests for beach umbrellas.
This April, ASTM officially released a standard consumer safety specification for beach umbrellas and related anchor devices. The standard states that all beach umbrellas should be held in place with at least 75 pounds of resistance and should remain secure in winds up to 30 mph.
Schermerhorn says this new standard gives commercial entities clear guidelines on how to safely secure beach umbrellas. He adds that authorities who govern public beaches will also be able to inform the public that if they use a beach umbrella, they must use a compliant umbrella and anchor or run the risk of being asked to take it down.
Schermerhorn suggests retailers offering any noncompliant umbrellas should ensure they offer compliant umbrella anchors in line with the new ASTM standard. He notes that the BeachBub base he invented is compliant with the standard and can be an option for retailers, and he suspects other products will come out that are in line with the new standard.
Schermerhorn adds that he’s hopeful that the new ASTM standard for beach umbrellas will have a lasting impact on beach safety. He says even Bernard “BJ” Fisher, director of the American Lifeguard Association, thanked him in an email for his work on the new standard and for offering the BeachBub base and umbrella as a safer option for beach-goers.
“I did this to leave a legacy for the beach community and to make beaches safer and avoid accidents like the one I saw in 2009,” Schermerhorn says. “It’s a preventable situation for the most part. This new standard is long overdue. I’m excited about this, and I think it will have a tremendous impact.”
