Bottled water is a huge industry. Major beverage producing companies have latched onto the profit wave of bottling and marketing water. That’s right, water. When you think about the concept of selling water in a bottle at a premium, it all comes down to packaging and marketing, even if the water does taste good. One widely held belief by those who buy bottled water as an alternative to tap water is that the water tastes better or is more pure. The notion that bottled water tastes better and is healthier is one of the major reasons the bottled water industry is so lucrative.

If you can’t convince people that a beverage tastes good or is good for them, you can profit from it. The question of whether or not there is a better or worst bottled water is really a question of brand loyalty because when you look close, water is water.

Bottled Water Misconceptions

Sometimes you just have to buy bottled water. In places where the tap water is not clean to drink or on a hot day at a music festival where the only hydration option is the bottled water selling for three dollars, you’re stuck. Recognizing that bottled water is good to have in some instances doesn’t validate some of the misconceptions surrounding bottled water. Bottled water may be the only potable form of water you have at times, but that doesn’t make it superior to anything but the contaminated alternative.

One serious misconception about bottled water is that it is purer than tap water. This is mostly marketing talking. Bottled water companies typically buy municipal water, filter it, and add minerals. While the label on the seven dollar, textured plastic bottle claims that the water originates in the purest mountain springs, twenty five to forty percent of bottled water comes from U.S municipal water sources, according to the EPA. This certainly doesn’t mean that the water is inferior, just ordinary. The EPA has stringent water quality codes so getting EPA regulated water in the bottle may not be a bad thing. The FDA oversees bottled water, so if you get bottled water that didn’t come from municipal supplies, there is a chance that the codes weren’t as high for quality.

Another misconception that is associated with bottled water is better taste. This often has to do with the perception that bottled water is purer and, therefore, tastes better. While taste is a more subjective criteria for evaluating a beverage, taste in water comes down to mineral concentrations. Truly purified water is devoid of all minerals and salts.This is done through a distillation process and usually leaves the water with a flat, insipid taste. Interestingly, refrigerating tap water in a container can often eliminate any chlorine tastes. The ‘flavors’ that many people claim to taste or prefer in bottled water are usually the minerals like sodium, magnesium, calcium, and chlorides. Many bottled water companies add minerals to the water after filtration for ‘taste’.

Right along with taste, bottled water is routinely perceived as healthier than tap, even though we now know that a good percentage of bottled was is effectively tap water. Marketing and packaging are well designed to fuel the perception that the water in the bottles is healthier. Any enhancements in bottled water usually involve sugars and artificial flavorings that don’t make the water healthier. Minerals or vitamins are often negligible in terms of suggested daily vitamin intake. If you really want to find a health benefit of water, look for fluoride. This is usually found in tap water over bottled.

One final misconception about bottled water is that because bottles can be recycled, they are not a strain on the environment. Once manufacturing, shipping, stocking, and marketing are factored into the overall production, however, you realize that bottled water consumes a lot of natural resources from start to finish. What’s more, according to the Earth Policy Institute, over eighty percent of plastic water bottles end up in the trash anyway. Clearly, bottled water is not sustainable, nor is it purer, and nor is it proven that it is healthier or even tastes better. It’s just water with a catchy label.

About Author :  Ben Vaughn has written on home cooling systems, the truth about bottled water, and best ways to save energy at home. He finds bottled water to be expensive and recently checked out whole home water filters from www.superiorwateranair.com.
Image Source 1