The Real Dumb Story of Bottled Water and the Lying Liars Who Tell It (Sorry Al Franken)
The International Bottled Water Association (IBWA), the public relations arm of the bottled beverage industry, is taking another shot at controlling the message about water. This time, they point to a succession of overturned bans on bottled water to try to convince people that consumers are changing their minds about buying their “products,” the same product that is available without extra packaging from your tap at home.
Three overturned bans is a telling situation, but it’s probably more about hiring heavy-hitting lawyers than it is about consumers changing their minds. Let’s not forget that IBWA has friends in high places—like the governor of Virginia, for example. It would be difficult for IBWA to prove that the overturned ban in Virginia is a result of consumers banging on the state house’s front door. But, it would be really easy to point to the money that the McDonnell election campaign received from bottled water companies and think, “Now, THIS could be the reason the ban was overturned.”
In addition to this silly notion of consumers overturning bans, the IBWA fired back at the heavy-hitting film, The Story of Bottled Water with the equivalent of a finger-propelled rubber band. Their response, called The Real Story of Bottled Water falls short of extolling any “virtues” of a wasteful consumer product. The video completely misses on responding to the real criticisms of bottled water. I won’t even take a jab at the claymation bottle of water character they use. That would be below the conveyor belt.
IBWA continues to distract consumers by emphasizing how their product is recycled more than any other. In their eyes, that somehow makes them environmentally responsible. But they put more of their plastic bottles into the marketplace than anyone else. They focus on post-consumer recycling, but they’re adding packaging where it isn’t needed, and it puts the burden on consumers to figure out how to deal with the 80 percent of bottles that end up in landfills. They want to expand recycling instead of producing less waste. They also use close to 47 million gallons of oil to produce plastic water bottles for Americans every year. Does that sound responsible?
IBWA created a bottle of water character out of clay to convince us that their product is safe, reliable and environmentally responsible. Safe: tap water is regulated for safety, where bottled water is not. Environmentally responsible: they create more garbage by adding a bottle. Tap water in a reusable container is the MOST environmentally responsible way of drinking water. Expensive: They failed to mention that bottled water is much more expensive than tap. This leaves us with reliable. Well, I have to agree with them there. They are reliable at delivering an unsafe, environmentally threatening product.
I hope that people aren’t easily tricked by IBWA’s ruse. IBWA’s version of the Story of Bottled Water is a particularly dumb story. They can tell us that consumers are changing their minds about bottled water and that they anticipate a successful fiscal year, but it’s more likely that they are covering up for the dwindling sales of bottled water from the past two years.
-Rich Bindell
Its very easy to drink tap water while in your home or at your workplace, but the most discouraging aspect to the bottled water v. tap water debate is the invisible barrier to access that people perceive when trying to stay hydrated while out and about. Asking a stranger to refill your reusable bottle in a shop or restaurant can be awkward and unnerving for many people, especially when a simple alternative is readily available in the form of a disposable bottle of spring water. Social discomfort swiftly trumps individual common sense. We’ve actually been developing and delivering a community-based initiative across Canada to help rectify this issue. Using our website (bluew.org) and smart phone application, we work in partnership with municipalities, local businesses and conservation groups to provide online mapped details on where to find clean, free sources across the nation to refill your reusable bottle without feeling compelled to make any additional purchases. We’re working hard to give people barrier-free access to clean, healthy tap water while out of their homes.
I’d just like to comment about the virginia politician, who’s state realizes millions upon millions of dollars in tax money generated by the sale of bottled water, the tax rate is 9.5% when I left in 2007. Virginia Beach alone has over 1 million tourists a year, who ALL buy bottled water, which has some of the highest prices I’ve ever seen for water, but of course, at 9.5% tax on each and every bottle, the higher the price, the more tax revenue for these crooks! As for the other guy’s post about convienience, bottle it at home, using a britta water filter on your tap, and you’ll save $1600.00 a year for a family of 4 whole average one bottle a day at $1.25!, read a book called every drop for sale, that’ll get you seeing the “real” picture about water, and industry! Oh, and by the way, did anyone ever tell anyone that the Bush family, has purchased 100,000 acres in paraguay, and another 90000 acres in uraguay, both parcels just happen to be sitting on top of the largest fresh water aq
I’d just like to comment about the virginia politician, who’s state realizes millions upon millions of dollars in tax money generated by the sale of bottled water, the tax rate was 9.5% when I left in 2007. Virginia Beach alone has over 1 million tourists a year, who ALL buy bottled water, which has some of the highest prices I’ve ever seen for water,($2.00-2.89 per 16 ozs.) but of course, at 9.5% tax on each and every bottle, the higher the price, the more tax revenue for these crooks! As for the other guy’s post about convienience, bottle it at home, using a britta water filter on your tap, and you’ll save $1600.00 a year for a family of 4 who’ll average one bottle a day per person at $1.25!, read a book called “Every Drop For Sale” that’ll get you seeing the “real” picture about water, and industry! Oh, and by the way, did anyone ever tell anyone that the Bush family, has purchased 100,000 acres in paraguay, and another 90000 acres in uraguay, both parcels just happen to be sitting on top of the largest fresh water aquifer in the southern hemisphere?
no, I don’t suppose anyone’s heard of it, but it’s the truth…what they couldn’t do to strangle people with oil, they’re going to do with water. put that in your pipe and smoke it.. these are evil people who run this world, and they should be held responsible.
while they pollute the water we have access to, they sell us water the “manufacture”, and tax us for the privelage!
My apologies to Evan, I didn’t completely read his post, well done Evan, wish we could have that kind of co-operation here.