DIVE IN TO SHARK WEEK’s 30TH ANNIVERSARY WITH SEVERAL JAWSOME PARTNERSHIPS

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

July 16, 2018

DIVE IN TO SHARK WEEK’s 30^TH ANNIVERSARY WITH SEVERAL JAWSOME PARTNERSHIPS

SHARK WEEK Kicks Off Sunday, July 22 on Discovery

(Los Angeles) – SHARK WEEK, television’s longest-running and eagerly awaited summer TV event returns to Discovery Channel on Sunday, July 22 at 8:00 PM ET/PT and continues through Sunday, July 29. To celebrate the 30^th anniversary, SHARK WEEK 2018 will feature the most hours of shark programming ever, with over twenty hours of all-new jaw-dropping shark stories and groundbreaking scientific discoveries. SHARK WEEK has once again collaborated with an impressive list of marketing partners, giving fans the opportunity to celebrate and experience SHARK WEEK in unique and fintastic ways, while also enabling the millions of SHARK WEEK fans everywhere to to support hammerhead shark conservation efforts around the world.

This year, SHARK WEEK announces several new partners – Tinder, Equinox and Lyft. Returning partners include Southwest®, Great Clips, Pledgeling, Georgetown Cupcake, Oceana, MLB Network and Live Love Polish. In addition, on July 21 SHARK WEEK will be hosting beach cleanups with Ocean Conservancy at beaches nationwide including Rockaway Beach in New York, the Santa Monica Pier in Los Angeles, Osterman Beach in Chicago, South Point Pier Park in Miami and Beverly Triton Beach in Annapolis. Shark fans can head to oceanconservancy.org/shark-week-2018 and RSVP to a cleanup in their area.

Joining SHARK WEEK as first-time partners are Tinder, Pledgeling, Equinox and Lyft. Launched in 2012, Tinder is the world’s leading social app for meeting new people. With its global reach, people in more than 190 countries around the world are swiping right to connect with others. Tinder and Discovery created five SHARK WEEK branded profile cards that will be live in the Tinder app from July 10 to July 29. The cards feature different sharks from all swims of life that offer their best advice to how to find a SHARK WEEK date and how to help save sharks around the world. In addition, SHARK WEEK, Tinder and Pledgeling teamed up to give three winners and their respective dates a chance at a fin-tastic shark diving trip to the Bahamas. Pledgeling, the pioneering charitable giving platform that makes it easy for every business to give back, is also powering donations across both the Tinder app, where users can swipe to donate after matching for their fin-tastic date, as well as a text-to-donate campaign promoted on air and across other digital channels to benefit SHARK WEEK’s nonprofit partner Oceana. To donate now through July 29, simply text SHARK to 707070.

MLB Network is the ultimate television destination for baseball fans, and this year it teamed up with SHARK WEEK for the ultimate double play – a chance to win a trip to the 2018 MLB® All-Star Game® and an exclusive Shark Week prize pack, because nothing says summer like Shark Week and baseball. MLB Network’s programming features the multiple Emmy Award-winning MLB Tonight, plus live regular season and Postseason game telecasts, original documentaries, highlights, insights and analysis.

Equinox is getting in on the SHARK WEEK fun for the first time this year. From July 15-July 22, Equinox will be hosting SHARK WEEK themed EQX swim classes at their Newport and South Bay locations. In addition, SHARK WEEK swim caps will be available and on July 17 and 18, Equinox will host advance screenings of Great White Abyss and SHARK WEEK swag giveaways at the pool areas of their Newport and South Bay locations. Equinox operates 94 upscale, full-service clubs in New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Miami, Chicago, Boston, Dallas, Houston, and Washington, DC, as well as international locations in London, Toronto, and Vancouver.

SHARK WEEK fans will be able to get safely to their sharky celebrations with Lyft. From July 20-July 29, Lyft app users will have the opportunity to end code SHARKWEEK to unlock a custom SHARK WEEK Lyft experience and will be automatically entered to win a shark diving trip for 2 to the Bahamas! Lyft is the fastest growing rideshare company in the U.S. and is available to 95 percent of the US population as well as in Ontario, Canada.

Southwest® is celebrating the 30th anniversary of Shark Week by releasing a Shark Week Fleet of five aircraft, each proudly displaying custom artwork featuring a species of shark often showcased in a Shark Week episode.  For customers eager to find out if their flight will be serviced by a special shark aircraft can visit FlightAware.com where the airline’s Shark Week Fleet can be tracked and spotted via custom-created shark icons.  Onboard Southwest flights, customers can enjoy the pre-premiere episode of Great White Abyss showcasing an expedition to Mexico’s Guadalupe Island, a hot spot for great white sharks.  And if you want to experience the adventure firsthand, head to southwest.com/sharkweek to enter for a chance to win the Dare to Dive sweepstakes, an all-inclusive five-day great white shark cage diving excursion off Guadalupe Island, Mexico, with Islander Charters. 

This is Live Love Polish’s second year partnering with Discovery Channel and Oceana to celebrate SHARK WEEK, and the custom collection features four thermally reactive polishes and nail vinyl’s inspired by sharks. The collection includes a dark blue polish, ‘Midnight Mako’, a yellow polish, ‘Lemon Shark’, a teal polish, ‘Shark Spark’ and a red polish, ‘Sharkify My Love’ which will be sold online at www.livelovepolish.com. Live Love Polish is a New York City based beauty brand that specializes in creating non-toxic, cruelty free, and vegan nail polishes with incredibly unique finishes.

Great Clips, the world’s largest salon brand with more than 4,300 salons in the U.S. and Canada has partnered with SHARK WEEK for the sixth year in a row. Great Clips and Discovery will encourage fans to give back through a donation program to Oceana. For every Great Clips Online Check-In app downloaded during the month of July, Great Clips will donate $1 to Oceana shark conservation efforts (up to $10,000). The Great Clips partnership will also feature in-salon co-branded signage in salons nationwide throughout the month of July.

Discovery continues its partnership with Oceana, the largest international conservation group working solely to protect the world’s oceans. This year, Oceana and Discovery are teaming up to help protect vulnerable hammerhead sharks, which are one of the species most threatened by the shark fin trade. Among all shark species, fins from as many as 73 million sharks end up in the global shark fin trade each year. The fight against this brutal, wasteful practice is also supported by collaborations with major brands that raise money for Oceana’s campaigns and create content to educate fans about why healthy oceans need sharks. Since its formation in 2001, Oceana has protected more than 4.5 million square miles of ocean, advocated for science-based fisheries management in major fishing countries and saved innumerable animals including sea turtles, sharks and dolphins.

Lastly, Shark enthusiasts can satisfy their sweet tooth with our returning partner Georgetown Cupcake. This year, Georgetown Cupcake has created the 2018 Shark Week Dozen, which are available in all locations nationwide as well as on georgetowncupcake.com. The partnership will also feature in-store signage at all locations. In addition, Georgetown Cupcake will be baking and frosting with Chompie Jr. and building a Shark Week-themed cupcake installation live on the Cupcake Cam on Thursday, July 19^th (TLC.com/CupcakeCam). Georgetown Cupcake was founded by sisters Katherine Kallinis Berman and Sophie Kallinis LaMontagne, best-selling authors of The Cupcake Diaries and Sweet Celebrations and stars of DC Cupcakes and Cupcake Cam LIVE on TLC. Celebrating its 10th Anniversary this year, Georgetown Cupcake has become a destination for cupcake lovers from around the world.  Georgetown Cupcake has locations in Washington DC, Bethesda, New York City, Boston, Los Angeles, and Atlanta and ships its cupcakes nationwide. 

About Discovery Channel

Discovery Channel is dedicated to creating the highest quality non-fiction content that informs and entertains its consumers about the world in all its wonder, diversity and amazement. The network, which is distributed to 100.8 million U.S. homes, can be seen in 224 countries and territories, offering a signature mix of compelling, high-end production values and vivid cinematography across genres including, science and technology, exploration, adventure, history and in-depth, behind-the-scenes glimpses at the people, places and organizations that shape and share our world. For more information, please visit www.discovery.com.     

About Discovery:

Discovery, Inc. (Nasdaq: DISCA, DISCB, DISCK) is a global leader in real life entertainment, serving a passionate audience of superfans around the world with content that inspires, informs and entertains. Discovery delivers over 8,000 hours of original programming each year and has category leadership across deeply loved content genres around the world. Available in 220 countries and territories and 50 languages, Discovery is a platform innovator, reaching viewers on all screens, including TV Everywhere products such as the GO portfolio of apps and Discovery Kids Play; direct-to-consumer streaming services such as Eurosport Player and Motor Trend OnDemand; digital-first and social content from Group Nine Media and a strategic alliance with the PGA Tour to create the Global Home of Golf. Discovery’s portfolio of premium brands includes Discovery Channel, HGTV, Food Network, TLC, Investigation Discovery, Travel Channel, Turbo/Velocity, Animal Planet, and Science Channel, as well as OWN: Oprah Winfrey Network in the U.S., Discovery Kids in Latin America, and Eurosport, the leading provider of locally relevant, premium sports and Home of the Olympic Games across Europe. For more information, please visit www.corporate.discovery.com and follow @DiscoveryIncTV across social platforms.