Have you ever wondered why bottled water has taken hold in our society to the point where we’ll gladly pay three times the cost of a gallon of gas for it? Certainly, it’s handy. In the past we’d have to tote our own in some sort of container, find the closest workable water fountain and hope we didn’t catch “cooties” off the mouthpiece.

In this fascinating and comprehensive article by Fast Company (http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/117/features-message-in-a-bottle.html), three things jumped out at me:

1. Marketers leveraged “exclusivity”, “health consciousness” and “celebrity endorsement” to promote the product

2. If the water we use at home cost the same as even cheap bottled water, our monthly bills would be $9000!

3. We pitch 38 billion water bottles a year into public landfills

The author makes the point that in the U.S., some communities don’t even need filtration systems due to the purity of the water source, yet we spend billions of dollars each year to purchase something that is readily available and safe to drink straight out of the tap. They also raise the ethical dilemma of wasting resources for something that is purely a fad while 1 billion people worldwide have no reliable source of drinking water.

This is a fascinating marketing study on how a product can infiltrate our society to the point where consumers expect it just like their morning cup of coffee. I’m not sure that speaks well for our ability to make sound choices regarding how we spend our money, but it certainly should be a case study for any entrepreneurship or marketing college course.

How to take a commodity item (water), package and promote it so successfully that it becomes a norm in most households, eating establishments and workplace envirionments. How to price that product in such a way that while we scream about the price of gas per gallon, we willingly plunk down hard earned cash for something that almost everyone can access for free 24/7. Something that also contributes to clogged landfills and littered roadways.

Amazing! Read the article. It’s very well done and will give you something to talk about around the water cooler at work tomorrow! 

(smile) Laura