How the other half hydrates.
From Nalgene to Sigg, the water bottle as accessory is nothing new. Conspicuously carrying one says, “Water fountain? HA. I care about my body enough to bring this enormous canteen with me everywhere, as if I’m perpetually returning from training to be a Navy Seal and/or hiking the Pacific Crest Trail.” Carrying a reusable water bottle means YOUR hydration is never left to chance.
But unfortunately, it doesn’t lead to recurring revenue, and that made Nestle sad. The $92 billion food giant owns more than 8,000 brands, among them Arrowhead Water and Poland Spring, but none apparently has the cachet of a Lifestyle Water — essentially, a drinkable purse. (Nestle also owns Perrier and San Pellegrino, but since they’re fizzy, they aren’t part of the coveted “premium still water” niche.)
Enter Nestle’s new bottled water, Resource. It’s not for every lady, though: mostly “trendy” and “higher-income” 35-year-olds, according to Resource spokesperson Larry Cooper, making it more of a liquid Coach bag than Target tote. “We want to raise it to the level of a lifestyle brand, where she’s proud to carry around Resource as her bottled water accessory, so to speak,” Cooper told The New York Times. Except that even handbags typically are used for more than a few hours before being discarded. Notes the Times:
Environmental groups including the Natural Resources Defense Council generally discourage drinking bottled water because of resources required to source, bottle and ship the water, not to mention the impact on the waste stream.
Um, yeah.
Drink in this weird ad for Resource disguised as a performance art piece:
Well yes we certainly want to … do … those things! Totally worth generating a new piece of trash every time we feel thirsty.
