Bumper stickers sell briskly, mocking beach crackdown

“I swam in Fresh Pond and lived” is the most popular of the local-message bumper stickers for sale at Eagle Deli on West Neck Road, according to store manager Alex Hampsas.

He credited part-time Eagle worker Meaghan Derby with coming up with the idea the idea of selling bumper stickers that tap into Islanders’ concerns about where they can or can’t swim this summer.

The deli sells similar bumper stickers for Shell Beach and Menhaden Lane. The Suffolk County Department of Health Services this spring raised local hackles when it warned the town it can’t treat those places as if they were public bathing beaches because they lack the legally required facilities such as lifeguards and bathrooms. In response, the town posted a sign at each site that reads, “Not a Bathing Beach.”

Ms. Derby, 22, studied graphic arts at The College of St. Rose in Albany and said the idea came to her as she and Mr. Hampsas were discussing the beach issue.

Suffolk County Department of Health Services officials have maintained they’re only enforcing state regulations about what can or can’t be called a beach. The hullabaloo started with a complaint filed with the county by Island resident Vincent Novak about people swimming at the Fresh Pond town landing.

“This isn’t an attack on Mr. Novak,” Ms. Derby said. Nor was it “a plan to make a business,” she  said. “I thought it would be fun.”

It started as a whim but has taken on a life of its own because the bumper stickers are hot items.

“The whole thing is kind of crazy,” she said.

Ms. Derby arranged to have the bumper stickers printed through an Internet site, paying $70 for the first batch of 60 stickers.

They’re on sale for $5 each. The first batch sold out in a  matter of days, Ms. Derby said. She ordered more for the Memorial Day weekend. While year-round residents have been well aware of the controversy, some weekenders who hadn’t been following the news were confused by the stickers, Ms. Derby said. But once informed, they were ready to buy.

Has she ever been swimming at any of the banned sites? As a child, she swam in Fresh Pond and she still likes to go to Shell Beach, she said.