Reference no: EM133949061

Question

Bottled Water: Money Down the Drain?

Bottled water is everywhere! And, up until 2007 consumption was rapidly growing in the $11 billion industry. In fact, per capita consumption grew from less than two gallons per year to 29 gallons in 2007. However, according to the Beverage Marketing Corporate, a New York research and consulting firm, sales declined by 3.2% since 2007 and the decline has not been halted.

Bottled water companies are still trying to determine what has caused this drop in sales but there might be several causes. The first is the recession. Tap water is far cheaper and consumers may be pulling back on expenses. Single serving bottled water costs up to 4000 times more than tap water. In fact, we pay more than three times as much for bottled water than gasoline (almost $12 per gallon!).

Second, there are some health concerns. According to the Natural Resources Defense Council up to 70% of bottled water is not regulated by the Food and Drug Administration because it never crosses sate lines. In addition, city water systems must report on water quality. Bottlers successfully killed this requirement for bottled water. Up to 70% of bottled water is unregulated by the Food & Drug Administration, because it never crosses state lines for sale, according to the Natural Resources Defense Council.

So, there may be a health cost, too. In 2008 the Environmental Working Group examined ten brands of bottled water and fond that some contained mixtures of industrial chemicals that had not been safety tested. Third there are environmental concerns. Tap water is a local product that needs no packaging. Globally, bottled water accounts for as many as 1.5 million tons of plastic waste annually, according to the Sierra Club. Making the plastic in the bottles requires 47 million gallons of oil annually. The anti-bottled water movement has a lot of momentum now, as well. There are web sites like Web sites like TakeBackTheTap.org,

InsidetheBottle.org and ThinkOutsideTheBottle.org that encourage consumers to stop drinking bottled water. Only about 20% of plastic water bottles get recycled. The rest end up in landfill or even worse, end up floating in big garbage patches in the Pacific Ocean. Publicity does not get much worse than this.

Questions

1. Imagine that you work in the public relations department of one of these bottled water companies. How might you respond to these criticisms? What is the other side of the story?

2. How are environmental issues affecting your purchasing choices? Or are they?

3. Think of a product that you regularly purchase and consider how it might be made more environmentally-friendly. Perhaps you could reduce packaging, reduce transportation costs, or change the manufacturing process. What could you do?