We were interested to see Mr Branson recently lending his support to the “Whole World Water” initiative as you can see in the video below. We support the philosophy behind the initiative and have a range of products suitable for installation within the catering & hospitality industry.
Full details on the initiative can be found on the Whole World Water website – which has been developed as a launch pad for the proposed global initiative. The involvement of Richard Branson is obviously a great boost, and we think that the focus on a specific industry makes the aims of the initiative achievable. Richard is now becoming more involved in the water filtration industry through the launch of Virgin Pure alongside Strauss Water.
A unified message to hotel/spa/hospitality customers that bottled water is produced onsite rather than trucked in is a strong environmental message that can only benefit the brands involved. However we question whether customers will be willing to pay for purified water in the same way a natural spring or mineral water.
There is precedent in the restaurant trade thanks largely due to the efforts of the Vivreau brand. Many restaurants now use reusable bottles alongside water filter systems that produces drinking water that can then be either sold or given away to customers. The filtered water is dispensed through a drink water tap on the bar and served in glass water jugs to the customers. But customers are becoming wiser and increasingly are unwilling to pay for this filtered water produced onsite.
The Whole World Water initiative needs to work hard to educate customers on the type of water that they are being offered. Explaining in detail the quality of the water and the reasons for the cost. The majority of customers will not think to carefully read the labels on the glass bottles and often feel cheated when they discover that they are in fact being charged for tap water filtered onsite.
The hospitality industry would do well to study the public’s response to being charged for filtered water – irrational or not the Coke Dasani launch in the UK has strong lessons for us all.
Our range of drinking water fountains, plumbed water coolers and water filtration products are available to hotels & restaurants across the UK. The Water Cooler Company work with customers through the purchasing and installation of equipment – as well as advising customers on the roll out to customers.
