Aug 1, 2007
>> Is Bottled Water Proof that Consumers are Daft?
Our headline was “borrowed” from this recent Economist article which discusses the latest revelation that PepsiCo’s Aquafina brand of bottled water is actually purified tap water from public sources (but was not clearly described as such). And it goes on to analyse why consumers seem willing to believe that bottled water is better despite compelling doubts (e.g here, here and here).
Below is Penn and Teller’s characteristically witty but poignant take on this, which just goes to show how lucrative FUD marketing can be – last year the US bottled water industry raked in $11bn.
Via Agencyspy
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Actually, Aquafina is not tap water- although it’s obtained from a public water source, it then goes through 7 additional steps of purification. This was also indicated on the label. IMO, the media is making a big deal out of nothing.
I’m not sure I agree that it’s totally a question of media overkill, although there’s a lot of this going around (the TV authenticity debacle being played out in the UK, for example).
Remember the Dasani experience in the UK – whether or not the media created the initial fuss, the public soon voted with their wallets.
Maybe there needs to be more education plus much more effective product design and labelling. It’s evident that there are different classes of bottled water: spring-sourced, above type etc. But I suspect that communicating these differences through text on already busy labels only ensures that the differences get missed by your average Joe.
Call me a cynic but it seems to me that when companies really want to differentiate their products they generally succeed.