People have been putting bricks in their toilet for years. The old brick trick is employed to cut down on the amount of water waste during a flush. This saves money on water bills, and conserves during a drought.

 

It's a simple solution. Open the back of your toiled tank, put a brick inside, and the amount of water used is reduced by approximately half a gallon. Real bricks tend to decompose in a tank though, and can affect the plumbing negatively, so to solve this problem, a few clever San Franciscans put together a nonprofit called Drop-A-Brick. They found a way to make a better, longer lasting brick, and simultaneously launch an awareness campaign for California's current drought nightmare.

 

Drop-A-Brick is a fake brick made out of rubber, and won't harm your toilet. Level 2 Industries, Drop-A-Brick's manufacturing partner, developed the brick with a rubber exterior, and a hydrogel filling. Hydrogel is used in baby diapers, agriculture, and floral design for its absorptive properties. This thing is heavy enough to sink to the bottom of the tank, and squishy enough to maneuver around plumbing. Level 2 has agreed to produce Drop-A-Brick at a low cost considering the west coast water crisis, and the potential help it could give in this situation.

 

The company needs $80,000 to get started. Drop-A-Brick is currently crowdfunding on Indiegogo, and as of the end of day on Oct 20th they had almost $21,000. There is a month to go before the deadline. The company is also starting a brick gifting program, "Donate-A-Brick," encouraging people to not only buy a brick for themselves, but to also purchase bricks for low-income communities.

 

The campaign claims that with the brick families can save up to 2 gallons of water per day, per person. They assert that if everyone in California used a brick we would save 6 billion gallons of water in 90 days.