Culture & Events Newsletter
Internal · Vol. 14 · May/June 2026
— Culture & Events
Two big months ahead.
Hey team — we're warming the new office, running across a bridge, planting 200 trees, and (yes) settling once and for all who is the Mario Kart champion of Sunshine Co. Here's everything on the calendar.
Compiled by Casey Nguyen
People Ops • May 02, 2026
MAY
18
SUN
🏃 Portland Bridge Run — 10K
Hawthorne Bridge · 7:15 AM meet
23 of us are running. Company covers registration. Bright orange team shirts (designed by Alex) — on brand, unmissable. Captain: Tomás Herrera.
7:15 AM | Meet at the Hawthorne Bridge start line |
6:30 PM | Maya's "State of Sunshine" talk (10 min, Maya) |
Want in? Sign up in #fun-run by May 10 — shirts get picked up from the printer May 15.
JUNE
12
THU
🏠 Office Warming Party
340 Oak Street · 4:00 – 9:00 PM
First event in the new space. Tours for remote folks, rooftop food, a (short!) talk from Maya, and Derek on the decks.
4:00 PM | Office tours for remote folks who haven't seen it yet |
5:00 PM | Drinks & food on the rooftop terrace, catered by Pok Pok |
6:30 PM | Maya's "State of Sunshine" talk (10 min, Maya) |
7:00 PM | DJ set by Derek Chung — yes, our Derek, he's actually good |
9:00 PM | Wrap |
Expecting ~160 incl. +1s · 12 remote teammates flying in (booked through TripActions) · new black hoodies with orange embroidery arrive June 10.
JUNE
30
FRI
🎮 Quarterly Game Night
Pizza, drinks, and the return of the (ridiculous, beloved) Golden Sunshine Trophy — 3D-printed by engineering, spray-painted gold.
Kart | Mario Kart tournament — Switch on the projector |
Trivia | "How well do you know your coworkers?" — Casey is writing questions from Slack history (slightly terrifying) |
Games | Board games corner, all night |
JULY
22
SAT
🌱 Volunteer Day with Friends of Trees
Columbia Slough · 9:00 AM – 3:00 PM
Annual volunteer day — this year we're planting 200 trees. Counts as a regular workday. Shuttle from the office, lunch provided.
Bring sunscreen, closed-toe shoes, and a water bottle. 87 of 160 in-office folks signed up so far — still room.
📚 Lunch & Learn — monthly
Real talks, free lunch
30 min talk · 15 min Q&A · recorded for remote folks
May 8 — "How we almost lost DataMesh (and won them back)" by Ava Christiansen
June 5 — "Security for non-security people" by Priya Sharma
July — open slot, suggest in #lunch-and-learn
📖 Book Club
Currently: The Staff Engineer's Path by Tanya Reilly
Next meet: May 22, 12:30 PM in the 3rd floor lounge.
Vote on the next book in #book-club — frontrunners: Build (Fadell), Thinking in Systems (Meadows), Unreasonable Hospitality (Guidara).
☕ Coffee Roulette
Random 1:1s across departments — 78 enrolled
"I met someone from the sales team I'd never spoken to. We had coffee and now I actually understand what our sales process looks like."
— an engineer
"Great way to feel connected when you're remote 4 days a week."
— a designer
Add yourself in #coffee-roulette to join.
Women @ Sunshine
42 members
Engineering leadership panel in May
Guest speaker from Stripe — confirmed
Mentorship: 12 active pairs
Pride @ Sunshine
June is here
Marching at Portland Pride, June 15
Donating $5,000 to The Trevor Project
Office decorated all month
2.4k | Jordan Lee — LinkedIn post on our product philosophy |
★ | Sam Rivera — quoted in The Pragmatic Engineer about our zero-downtime migration. |
380 | Mei-Ling Wu — first blog post ("Why we write release notes like humans") picked up by Hacker News, 380 points. |
#culture #fun-run #book-club
Sunshine Co · 340 Oak Street, Portland, OR 97204 · Good tools for good teams.