Value of Bottled Water
The consumption of bottled water has been increasing consistently over the last few years. Some reasons why people decide for an option that is often more expensive and less comfortable than tap water, could be their dissatisfaction with tap water taste and health-risk concerns. Other factors could involve, demographic variables and the perceived quality of the water source. Trust in tap water companies also seems to influence public opinion. The demand for bottled water has consistently increased in the past decade. The trend has been observed worldwide, but the rates of increase vary accordingly to the country. It has been said; bottled water has become the fastest growing segment of non-alcoholic beverages.
Globally almost every country is accepting the bottled water culture. Millions of people get parts or all of their daily water values from bottled water. We can look at any local, national or international sporting event and see the usage of bottled water. Although many individuals will carry a reusable water bottle such as a Nalgene, most bottled water containers are thrown away after the first use. This may be due to the convenience of bottled water, as it is more easily available than tap water.

The bottled water culture's recent explosion in the last decade is due to many corporations' advertising efforts to promote the need to drink "healthy" bottled water rather than tap water. Multinational companies across the globe are racking in billions of dollars with very little effort. According to some, companies are taking free water and making huge sums of money, this is a response to very low restrictions on water withdrawal. Worldwide there are thousands of companies bottling water for profit. Almost all of these corporations make huge amounts of money. One only has to look at industry leaders such as Thames Water, Perrier, Vivendi, Suez, Pepsi and Coca-Cola to see how their profit margins have been on a steady increase over the last decade, in their bottled water divisions.
The most commonly given reason for purchasing bottled water was convenience. It is a lot easier to grab a bottle of water than to access water through other sources. Tap water could be a little risky depending on where you live, it's either free or very cheap but in most cases it tastes terrible and involves many pollutants. Tap water quality varies widely from one geographical region to the next.