Bottled Water Stores? Coming to Your Town!

Most of us who have a house dog or cat can tell you that these creatures will ignore their clean dish filled with bottled water, and head straight to the toilet if given half a chance. People are like that, too, though thankfully they seem to be in the minority more and more now that bottled water is so popular in America.

The latest trend in America's love affair with bottled water seems to be a phenomenon called a Water Store, which is catching on quickly all over the country. The first water store was opened by rapper Kanye West and his father Ray. The store is called Good Water, and it was opened in Maryland. Business was so good that they soon opened another one in the Washington, DC area. The premise of Good Water is that of a self-service bottled water store.

There are three different types of water that consist of Good, which is water that has been purified with a carbon filter, and is said to be 85% pure. Better, which is water that has been purified by reverse osmosis, and its purity is said to be like that of most kinds of bottled water. Then, there's Best, which is water that has been purified with the carbon filter, the reverse osmosis filter, and then by way of distillation, and is said to be 99.9% pure. Customers can either bring in their own containers of any sort and fill them with water, or they can purchase containers right there are the store.

Good Water purifies the water themselves, right there on the store's premises. There is a state of the art, regularly inspected distiller that is used on a daily basis... sometimes all day long in order to be able to keep up with the demand for water! The unit used for distillation is located inside a room that was specially designed for it that is of course kept very clean - sanitized even. This water is about as clean as you can get water to be, and since it is purified on site, you know that it is fresh, too.

Good Water also sells various brands of bottled water by the case, as well as their own Good Water brand, but the gem of the store is the fill-your-own-container water. They sell a refillable cup/glass with free refills for life at the time of this writing.

California has several water stores. One is called The Water Lady Water- N- Ice Store, also known informally as Sonya and Company, and located in San Diego. This water is purified by use of reverse osmosis, ozonation, carbon filtration, ultra-violet lighting, and more - 10 stages in all. You can see the filter through a window in the back of the store. The filtration is what the Water Lady calls her "recipe". The laboratory test results for this water are always placed in a prominent place inside the business, so that people can see just what this water is free of that tap water still contains. This water store has been described as "self service". Customers bring their own bottles and containers, and bottle up the water themselves. Water Lady also sells containers of different sizes, from large to small, including some made of glass for safer water storage. You can save some money here by pre-paying for your water, and several free gallons are then added to your account. Of course, since the water works out to be only 35 to 45 cents a gallon, pre-paying would be simply for convenience!

Another California location for a water store is in Santa Cruz. Called All Pure Water, which features vapor compressed, steam distilled water with all organic chemicals removed. It is said that distilled bottled water is the best bottled water a person can use. It supposedly will purify the blood and clean inside the body.

California probably has more water stores per capita than any other state, simply because California has a water shortage. Campbell, California has its Pure Water Stores, Baldwin Park has a Quality Water Mart, Lancaster has Water To Go, Bell Gardens has Agua Water Store, San Bernardino has The Water Connection, and there are many others across the state, too numerous to mention here. Las Vegas, Nevada alone lists 48 different water stores. Water stores are also in Canada and other countries.

Most people, of course, have never heard of a water store, and when you talk about one, nine times out of ten you are met with puzzled frowns. But, the idea is catching on, and it probably won't be too long before every good-sized city has at least one water store. Predictions are that bottled water will be so popular by the year 2012 that it will actually be a bigger seller than soda!

People are thinking more about health than value, and that's a very good sign that businesses like the water stores will do quite well. Even though the tap water they can get at home is virtually free, these educated consumers realize what tap water contains, and much prefer to drink water that they know is pure and clean, with no toxic chemicals, pharmaceutical drugs, or heavy metals in it. It seems like bottled water is here to stay!

Jon M. Stout is Chairman of the Board of Element H2O. For more information about bottled water, purified drinking water go to the Elementh2o website.