The Water Cooler Company London has been doing a significant amount of work recently on our plumbed water cooler offering to the hospitality trade – and one of the considerations we have had to make has been around the London-on-Tap initiative. Famed by Ken Livingstone and thus inherited by Boris Johnson, this initiative has been an unusual soapbox for London Mayors, and over time. It was launched by Thames Water in February 2008 and has received press coverage through the support or the Evening Standard initially, and the initiative has had copycat models in other cities around the world.
To the right you can see the result of a competition run by London-on-tap where designers were asked to design a “carafe for London” which would then be used to dispense drinking water to customers who have requested tap water. A visual statement of intent from restaurants that they are following the initiative and offering tap water to customers.
The headlines from the London-on-tap quote the normal taglines rolled out re tap water giving space to comment on the environmental cost of Fiji Water, and the savings if everyone drank tap water. To be fair to the campaign there is thought given to the importance of having consumer choice – but we would have liked to have seen the championing of tap water and English bottled water (two options for consumers). We would also have liked to have seen the issue widened to locally sourced produce and especially to English Wines – although bottled water from abroad is the alleged culprit there is no mention of the environmental cost of a New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc. A fully inclusive approach would have surely made a more logical and balanced argument.
What is interesting is that at no stage has the plumbed water industry sought to work actively with the initiative. Plumbed water coolers, drinking water fountains and undersink chillers potentially play a valuable part in any restauranteurs roll out of the London-on-tap initiative as they allow the caterer to provide tap water that has been filtered to remove any impurities and that is chilled to a level customer have come to expect.
There are products developed by the plumbed water cooler industry specifically for the catering trade – and which provide customers with a bar pump system that is housed on their bar facility and allow for the easy catering of a filter tap water to restaurant customers. The Water Cooler Company have installed these in facilities across London. Interestingly this is one of the points where the restaurant has looked to replace the income stream that they are potentially losing from bottled water sales. Across London customers are now often being aggressively charged for tap water that has been filtered through a bar pump system – just check to see if the bottle of water you are being charged for has the word “pure” on the bottle. This is potentially counter productive for the London-on-tap initiative but restaurants have to find a way to replace the income stream from bottled water they now cannot sell.
If you would like to discuss this further either email [email protected] or call 0845 500 4455.
