BATON ROUGE - Beads and throws you may have caught this Mardi Gras go a long way beyond just the backroom or the trash. Non-profits like The Arc Baton Rouge use those beads to help people with disabilities.

"I like doing arts and crafts, and I like going. I like doing Connect Four. I like coloring, and I like going out to the community," Amy Bergseid, who attends The Arc every day, said.

Money made from the bead funds is used for activities for adults with disabilities, from bowling alleys to job training and other community outings. 

"We have some individuals who don't have family. We're all they have. So the activities that we take them on, the places we take them are all they have," Dajarina Gray, who works at The Arc, said.

Staff at The Arc clean, sort, and pack Mardi Gras beads into Crawfish sacks, each one selling for $40.

"We put them in crawfish sacks, normally about 35 pounds per sack, and we've gone through 150 so far this year," JP Gaspard, the CEO of The Arc, said.

The Arc collects beads and throws year-round, and any that are too dirty or broken are thrown away. Every dollar from those beads goes right back into programs for adults with disabilities.