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| Bottlemania: How Water Went on Sale and Why We Bought It | 
 enlarge | Author: Elizabeth Royte
Publisher: Bloomsbury USA
Category: Book
List Price: $24.99
Buy New: $12.89
You Save: $12.10 (48%)
New (44) Used (9) from $12.89
Avg. Customer Rating:  14 reviews
Sales Rank: 24908
Media: Hardcover
Edition: 1st U.S. Ed
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 256
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.1
Dimensions (in): 5 x 5 x 0.8
ISBN: 1596913711
Dewey Decimal Number: 338.4766361
EAN: 9781596913714
ASIN: 1596913711
Publication Date: May 13, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
An incisive, intrepid, and habit-changing narrative investigation into the commercialization of our most basic human need: drinking water.
Having already surpassed milk and beer, and second now only to soda, bottled water is on the verge of becoming the most popular beverage in the country. The brands have become so ubiquitous that we’re hardly conscious that Poland Spring and Evian were once real springs, bubbling in remote corners of Maine and France. Only now, with the water industry trading in the billions of dollars, have we begun to question what it is we’re drinking and why.
In this intelligent, eye-opening work of narrative journalism, Elizabeth Royte does for water what Eric Schlosser did for fast food: she finds the people, machines, economies, and cultural trends that bring it from nature to our supermarkets. Along the way, she investigates the questions we must inevitably answer. Who owns our water? What happens when a bottled-water company stakes a claim on your town’s source? Should we have to pay for water? Is the stuff coming from the tap completely safe? And if so, how many chemicals are dumped in to make it potable? What’s the environmental footprint of making, transporting, and disposing of all those plastic bottles?
A riveting chronicle of one of the greatest marketing coups of the twentieth century as well as a powerful environmental wake-up call, Bottlemania is essential reading for anyone who shells out two dollars to quench their daily thirst.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 9 more reviews...
 An expose that merits more attention May 21, 2008
43 out of 44 found this review helpful
This is a remarkably interesting read that I am afraid hasn't gotten the attention it deserves. Ever since I read an article on "Fast Company" on the phenomenon of bottled water, I have been intrigued by it. A recent review in "Seed" introduced me to this book. I am glad that I read it.
Despite the "funny" review of a top 1000 reviewer (imagine that) that considers this book as propaganda for more regulation, it is quite the opposite. The book comes across as a systematic analysis of how the industry evolved and some on-the-scene reporting of key players like Nestle and Poland Springs. The chapter on the latter, neatly cataloging the unimaginable conflicts of interests and a apparently pliant local public officials, alone is worth the price of the book. It is impossible for a reader not to be shocked at some of the reporting (the author almost always avoids any preachy tone). The contrasts and comparisons drawn between the Freysburg and Kingsfield communities is an interesting read as well. There is another chapter that outlines some actions companies like Coke are taking to evaluate their footprint. Another chapter worth mentioning is "Something to Drink?" - the last chapter which takes a broader viewpoint and ties the topics to global warming and related issues. You will learn fun stats as "a cotton t-shirt is backed by 528.3 gallons of water and a single cup of coffee by 52.8 gallons".
Now, the negatives - The book takes a decidely US-centric narration. There is no extensive discussion on similar issues outside of the US (though there is some mention on the Coke debacle in India). The first-account narrative style helps to provide a very down-to-earth method to convey the ideas, but sometimes distracts from highlighting some of the salient points being made.
Nevertheless, an informative, entertaining read that will certainly question the utility of an entire industry.
Absolutely the Best Book on Nestle and the Predatory Bottled Water Industry May 17, 2008
40 out of 42 found this review helpful
Elizabeth Royte has written the best book available on the bottled water industry. Focusing on Nestle Waters North America and its Poland Spring operations in Maine, Royte's writing is knowledgeable, even-handed, and hip, and has none of the hyperbolic mewling that many environmentalist writers fall prey to. She provides sweeping and insightful coverage of the history, hydrogeology, chemistry, technology, politics, economics, and social psychology of the commodification of water. Readers will develop a better appreciation of just how unhealthy, environmentally destructive, and frankly crazy it is to buy and drink bottled water. An enlightening joy to read. Thanks, Elizabeth!
Don't be put off by the apparently trivial title June 6, 2008
26 out of 27 found this review helpful
The title is cute and catchy and implies the book is a lightweight screed about the erstwhile evils of drinking bottled water. Yes, the initial starting point for Ms. Royte's inquiry was asking some simple questions about the impacts and equities of a corporation bottling huge quantities of Maine springwater. But this is an important environmental book, in the same league as "An Inconvenient Truth".
This is because Ms. Royte's simple questions about bottled water lead her and us on an exploration of a whole hidden world of our water and sanitation resources and infrastructure that lies behind our taps. How does bottled springwater differ from tap water in terms of harmful biological and chemical contaminants? How did the fad of chugging water out of throwaway plastic bottles catch on? Where does our tap water come from? How is it treated? Is that necessarily good for us? What is happening to the watersheds that all of us depend on? How can they be protected? How are water and sanitation systems interrelated? Are these groundwater and freshwater issues affected by other environmental trends, like global warming? And so on.
Like Ms. Royte, you will probably come to the end of this brisk, readable work knowing a lot more about your own water and sanitation then you did when you began and have a much better appreciation of the somewhat unsurprising policy conclusions she reaches: that protecting our public drinking water "commons" makes more sense than drinking water bottled at distant plants.
Although judging by the cute title and cover art the topic might seem a bit frothy and more of a treatise on marketing and product development, the author's target is much wider. I am an environmental attorney and have handled permitting and litigation involving public water supply and sanitary treatment systems and bottled springwater, and am impressed by how the author is able to get so much technical detail right, while keep it readable and interesting to a lay audience. Ms. Royte has written one of the best general interest books in a long while on an important, probably, THE most important environmental topic (other than climate change/greenhouse gases) of "wat-san" and preserving/expanding our aging public water and sewer infrastructure. In getting to those conclusions by starting her inquiry with questions about commoditized bottled water, the author attempts to be evenhanded and fair in her depiction of the corporate and individual actors without overly indulging in anti-corporate bias.
My only minor quibble is the omission of any discussion of state licensing requirements and associated testing and reporting requirements (where it says, e.g., "NYSHD Cert. No. ___" on the label in small type). However, that's just a small omission, although I'm surprised the Nestle people didn't mention that there are state reviews of their in-house analytical and production data, it would seem to make their case stronger that water quality is not merely self-regulated or conforming only to advisory industry standards (i.e., IBWA) with respect to periodic testing, labeling and allowable maximum contaminant levels. That small error however does not detract significantly from the quality of this book. I've just ordered a few more copies of this book to share with several friends and colleagues who I think would be interested, that's how much I'm recommending it.
 Long on strident advocacy: short on provable facts August 2, 2008
11 out of 15 found this review helpful
I was pre-disposed to liking this book based upon its full title alone: "Bottlemania: How Water Went on Sale and Why We Bought It". Indeed, I look at people with their fancy, expensive bottled waters and chuckle. Tap water in most US cities is good enough for me. So I sat down with "Bottlemania", enitrely prepared to enjoy a roasting of the bottled water industry and (in my opinion) the foolish people who buy most of its wares.
I quickly realized that "Bottlemania" was long on strident advocacy and short on provable facts. Ms. Royte apparently sees herself as something on an Ida Tarbell, the early 20th Century "muckraker" whose "exposes" of Standard Oil roused the nation's indignation. Like Tarbell, however, Royte plays fast and loose with what she sets forth as "facts". For example, on pasge 84, the naked claim that ". . . nearly 40% of the nation's rivers and streams are too polluted for fishing and swimming, to say nothing of drinking." Says who? Royte provides no specific reference, no support for this remarkable claim. I spent some time trying to find a credible source and could not.
The Appendix supplied is " . . . a list of internet sources for more information on the topices covered in this book, as well as information on how to learn more about water quality in your area". Most of the sources provided are advocacy groups of one kind or another, not impartial purveyors of facts. Royte's bibliography consists mostly of newspaper and magazine articles.In short, Royte has approached her subject with an axe to grind and grind it she does.
While Royte does trot out alleged facts here and there from credible objective sources, I would not trust her reporting because of the adversarial edge she displays toward bottled water purveyors specifically, big corporations in general and, overall, the free market system.
The final chapter is a hodge-podge of practical suggestions for water conservation, a good idea no matter what your politics, and substantial government intervention to keep you from "wasting" water, including of course high taxes on water. We are to at less meat because "the water footprint of a four-ounce hamburger produced in California is 616 gallons". In keeping with Royte's style, no source is suggested for this alleged "fact". Thanks are given to Royte to "anti-globalization" groups.
It is really sad, I think, that Royte could not be bothered with supporting her arguments with attributable facts, because her basic points are valid. The unrestricted exploitation of water resources for water to bottle and sell at enormous profit is bad on the face of it. One needn't resort to the unprovable to prove this point. Royte's conclusion in the closing pages that "bottled water is often no better than tap water, [but] its environmental and social price is high . . ." is indisputable.
In sum, this could have been an excellent book and a substantial contribution to public discourse on an important subject. Instead is is a sensationalist tract filled with unprovable, agenda driven claims masquerding as "facts".
This book is written for those who already and unreservably believe in the "environmentalist" religion. It is not for those secularists who prefer that all claims be supported by provable facts.
Royte makes her beliefs clear in a single sentence: "[i]f someday I find myself wanting to buy bottled water, I will do it as an informed consumer, someone who knows tht the images on the label may not reflect an ecological reality, that part of its sticker price may be landing in the pockets of lawyers and PR flacks, that profits probably aren't benefiting those who live near the source, and that the bottle and its transportation have a significant carbon footprint".
Guess what, Ms. Royte, parts of the sticker price of your book goes into the pockets of lawyers and PR flacks. And it is unlikely that the people who cut down the trees used to make the paper your words are printed on don't profit significantly from their efforts. Speaking of carbon footprints, how about the energy consumed in making the paper and ink used in your book, the printing and transportation of it, the air conditioning in the stores where it is sold and so on?
Many of Royte's points are valid, but her sensationalist style strips her of credibility. In the final analysis, this just another anti-capitalist, anti-democratic screed. Too bad, because buried under all the left-wing rhetoric is a valid point: for the most part bottled water in the United States is wasteful silliness.
Jerry
 Environmentalist whacko propaganda May 16, 2008
10 out of 108 found this review helpful
If I wanted to make a donation to the NRDC, I would have done so directly. This is an unscientific, anti-scientific, ascientific, anti-market screed disguised as a book. Read it only if you are already convinced that the government does things better than the private sector under any and all circumstances.
Also poorly written.
I want my money back!
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