Recession Watch: Bottled Water Sales Dry Up

[Liberal_in_LA]

Posted August 13, 2009
Recession Watch: Bottled Water Sales Dry Up
By Ben Pappas

This year frugal Americans are voting with their tap, and environmentalists and family budgetary gurus are rejoicing: Sales of bottled water are on the wane and consumption of fancy H20 is down for the first time in a decade.

The downward trend was reported on by The Washington Post, which pointed out that Nestle - the largest seller of bottled water in the U.S. - saw their first decline in water sales profits in six years. Meanwhile, according to the trade organization Beverage Marketing Corp., bottled water consumption is down in the U.S. for the first time in a decade.

As previously reported by MainStreet, the trend can be viewed as positive for many reasons:

http://www.mainstreet.com/article/lifestyle/food-drink/recession-watch-bottled-water-sales-dry?cm_ven=msunited

[marmar]

1. The recession does have its upside.

Bottled water is a scam, and an environmental disaster.

[MrScorpio]

2. It's also a sign of faux elitism

In a nation where just about every household has clean safe water coming to it, Americans are wont to pay for the privilege of sporting water with a Goddamned name brand. Like Polo shirts and Reebok tennis shoes.

Clean water has been commodified by multi-national corporations in poorer nations and this threatens lives and even increases the threat of war in the Third World.

And we treat water like a status symbol.

It's ungodly.

[Warpy]

3. If you absolutely must take a bottle of designer water

to a chichi gym, by all means treat yourself to a Brita pitcher and keep refilling it.

Your wallet and the environment will thank you and the filtered water is better than anything you'll buy in one of those bottles that's been sitting in a warehouse for weeks.

[FLDem09]

8. I totally agree

Lazy mofos should filter their own water. Beside all those plastic bottles help raise petroleum prices.

[abumbyanyothername]

4. Not sure this is recession

Many are abandoning plastic bottles for health reasons.

[CakeGrrl]

5. Is there any correlation between this topic and the Fiji Water ad

that AdBot posted at the end of this thread before I logged in?

:D

[NightWatcher]

6. maybe people are wising up and buying reuseable bottles and drinking tap water

I'm a Klean Kanteen user myself.

[BlooInBloo]

7. Nothing like economic stress to get people to acknowledge the almost purely discretionary...

nature of bottled water.

Some places really need it, like Vegas. But for the vast majority, it's pure bourgeois.

[stevedeshazer]

9. A small bit of good news for the Great Pacific Garbage Patch

[EFerrari]

10. Good!