Here is another video highlighting the problems with the bottled water industry. The big example they give is about Fiji water selling in Cleveland however exactly the same principle applies to Ballarat water being sold in Melbourne - which is exactly what most of the bottled water cooler companies in Melbourne do!

1. You have to store spare full bottles.

2. Then comes the empty bottles to store!

3. If the deliveries are late/forgotten or you drink a bit more then you can run out of water.

4. A bottled water cooler is an open system - meaning that every time you change a bottle you introduce more bacteria to the system - did the last guy that changed the bottle wash his hands after being at the toilet then touched the neck of the new bottle?

5. Lifting and changing bottles is hazardous and awkward. Think OH&S.

6. Variable monthly bills depending on your useage and delivery notes to match up. How many times do they get it wrong?

7. Are old fashioned traditional coolers with the blue bottles not just so 80's looking?

8. You may be lucky and get the same delivery guy every week but more than likely another random will be coming in and out of your office...oh and what was that in point 4 again?

9. Lastly but most important is for environmental reasons, it is plain madness to have water - which is freely available through our taps, and perfectly safe - distributed and delivered by large trucks and vans, using up lot's of fuel in the process. It's like the time before refrigerators we used to have ice delivered by trucks and carts - now an out dated practice.

Even if you don't choose a filter system or even one of our coolers, you should still consider removing that old bottled water cooler. There is a water revolution taking place! 

Here are some good links to recent articles on banning bottled water and in particular response to the Bundanoon ban.

A small Australian town makes waves in the New York Times.

A BBC World Service interview with Jan Bender, the owner and chairman of Iskilde bottled water company in Denmark and Jeanette Longfield, the coordinator of Sustain, an organisation which has campaigned against bottled water in the UK, where they discusss the Bundanoon situation and if it's relevant to the EU.

I found this discussion interesting and Jan Bender had no option but to admit that there is no real difference between tap water and bottled water. Jeanette Longfield missed the point slightly of the Bundanoon protest as she linked this to Australia's drought when it was really an outcome of a protest against a bottler.