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Bottled water is a $10 billion industry, but companies are "determined to push ... into new demographics," by "distilling products aimed at children," reports Bo Emerson. "The multimillion-dollar marketing campaign includes animated ads on Nickelodeon, Cartoon Network and broadcast TV that features kids triumphing over boring parents with the help of the bulbous (Nestle [7]-brand) bottle. ... Karen Bennett of Atlanta, who tested the product for word-of-mouth [8] public relations firm BzzAgent, thought the idea was dumb. 'I'm not going to buy water bottles that don't fit in my cup holders,' was her initial reaction. Then her 10-year-old took to it like a duck to" ... well, you know. Another example of "water as an innovation platform" -- as Beverage Marketing Corp.'s Gary Hemphill described it -- is "a pre-sealed disposable ice tray filled with purified water." The expanding market for bottled water [9] products is mystifying, since a four-year study by Natural Resources Defense Council [10] "resolved that bottled water was no purer than tap."
Links:
[1] http://dev.prwatch.org/users/6/diane-farsetta
[2] http://dev.prwatch.org/topics/children
[3] http://dev.prwatch.org/topics/environment
[4] http://dev.prwatch.org/topics/marketing
[5] http://dev.prwatch.org/topics/public-relations
[6] http://www.addtoany.com/share_save?linkurl=http%3A%2F%2Fdev.prwatch.org%2Fspin%2F2006%2F10%2F5261%2Fbottled-water-babies&linkname=Bottled%20Water%20Babies
[7] http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Nestle
[8] http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Word_of_Mouth_Marketing_Association
[9] http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Water_wars
[10] http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Natural_Resources_Defense_Council
[11] http://www.cantonrep.com/index.php?ID=311130&Category=8