photo credit: Etwood
Loyd Schutte has described an interesting idea on the Resource Action Program’s Green Living blog:
We’ve all seen the vending machines in supermarkets that allow you to refill big 3-5 gallon bottles of water and some even refill the smaller 1-5 liter size, but how about a vending machine that not only sells filled, reusable water bottles like a soda vending machine, but refills the ones you’ve already bought with fresh, pure, great tasting water?
The bottles could be of a solid, reusable plastic like Nalgene that have an attached screw on lid. They could be custom branded for the institution (school) in which the machine is placed with a portion of the proceeds returned as a “fund raiser”. Of course the bottles need to be small like a pint or quart size for the backpack and desk.
Interesting idea. The only real problem I see is that you’re competing against something that’s free. Now, in our parent’s generation that would be an insurmountable obstacle, but today people are already used to paying for water and as some people become more and more afraid of their tap water supply, it might work.
http://www.resourceactionprograms.org/blog/index.php/2009/04/21/a-better-bottle-of-water/trackback/