Comments on: Bottled Water Industry Attacking Tap Water? (We’re Shocked… SHOCKED!)

By: TC

TC — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 04:08:00 +0000

It’s interesting just how often the industry turns to attack marketing – especially when they offer the pretense of doing otherwise.

The problem for water bottlers is their lifestyle marketing is being undermined by the reality of bottled water (it’s impacts and expense), and we’re exactly one celebrity boycott away from a real plunge in the industry – which would render most of their attempts to build new plants moot.

By: Daniel

Daniel — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 16:43:32 +0000

If these water bottlers find the content of tap water objectionable, they might want to stop using it as their primary source.

It is estimated that 40% of the bottled water sold actually comes from municipal sources, i.e. tap water.

This whole thing calls to mind the ad campaign employed by Fiji Water a couple years back, in which the company ran an ad saying something like “It says Fiji because it’s not made in Cleveland.”

Cleveland officials fired back by testing the city’s tap water against Fiji’s bottled water, only to find that Fiji’s bottled water contained a good bit more arsenic per part than the tap did.

The bottled water industry is foolish to try and fight against tap water using facts, logic or common sense. The industry has grown as a result of superior marketing efforts, not because it is indeed a better option than, say, filtering your tap water and transporting it in reusable containers.

The industry will indeed diminish once more marketing is devoted to showing the benefits of the tap.

By: TC

TC — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 14:17:36 +0000

Nestle’s PR machine certainly makes noise when their bottle features a marginally smaller paper label, but there’s nothing lighthanded about their legal and on-the-ground operatives when it comes to undermining public confidence in tap water – something that happens quite often.

By: charles scamman

charles scamman — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 23:01:56 +0000

On page 5 of the report “All Bottled Up – Nestle’s Pursuit of Community Water” by Food and Water Watch, below the heading ‘Florida Fights Back’ is the report that in October 2008, Nestle threatened to sue the Miami-Dade County Water and Sewer Department over radio ads promoting TAP WATER. I guess they’re not in competition so long as nobody espouses drinking tap water.