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Designer Water
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16947 |
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Section : |
LIFE
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| Issue
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4 / 1990 |
1,107 Words |
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Ronda Miller and Elyse Levine
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Thirsty? You have a choice. You can turn on the tap. Or you can toss down two bits (per eight-ounce glass) and join the rising tide of American consumers who are drinking more than three hundred million gallons of bottled specialty water each year. "Designer water" continues to be big business as we enter the nineties.
Government regulators in the Food and Drug Administration suspect that most consumers enjoy pricey bottled waters as a healthy alternative to soft drinks and alcoholic beverages. Not surprisingly, the Adolph Coors Company recently took the plunge into the bottled water market by announcing the introduction of its own line of designer water. Test marketing in the West is expected soon.
There is, apparently, an endless thirst for pure water among consumers today…at any cost. A quick scan of the shelves in a Lucky's supermarket in upscale Irvine, California, reveals no less than eighteen brands of bottled specialty water. The average price nationwide for an eight-ounce serving of plain sparkling spring water is about a quarter - costing anywhere from two and a half cents per ounce for Vittel's spa waters from the east of France, to almost five cents per ounce for pricey newcomer Hawaiian Waters.
For the purist on a budget, simple purified water in plain wrap costs half a cent per ounce. For the gourmet, there is a dizzying selection of libations complete with pedigrees. Evian hails from the French Alps, and Spa brand waters call the Belgium Ardennes home. The bottles of Canadian Natural and Canadian Glacier boast labels that announce their water is "imported." Then there's Perrier, Calistoga, Arrowhead Sparkling Spring Water, and Sparkletts' Seltzer.
In California, Orange County's "Gold Coast" boasts its share of yuppies who frequent restaurants that capitalize on the white-collar lunch trade's love affair with designer water. Is it pretension that drives one to shell out three dollars for a little green bottle of water? Health consciousness? Necessity?
Last fall, residents of posh Newport Beach wasted no time in conjecture when they foUnd tiny larvae in their tap water. Area supermarkets were swamped with upscale shoppers in search of bottled water. It was plainly a choice between chic and shriek.
The FDA aside, a large portion of the population considers public drinking water unfit. According to the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, a whopping 84 percent of its customers refuse to use tap water for drinking.
Considering the carcinogens, impurities, and transient life forms reportedly found in common tap water, it's easy to understand America's unquenchable thirst for bottled waters. One of the companies tapping into this lucrative market is Evian Waters of France, Inc., whose U.S. subsidiary reports a tenfold profit increase last year. Revenues were a reported $37.5 million, making Evian the seventh largest bottled-water company in America. Evian Chief Executive Officer David S. Daniels (who left Pepsi for Evian) gleefully noted for Fortune magazine: "there seems to be no limit to how much people can consume of our product."
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