Sometimes a Bottle of Water Isn’t Just a Bottle of Water – Part IV

By: Lee Ann Rush

The final two brands of bottled water we will investigate are Nirvana and Poland Spring. In Part III of this series, we saw that Fiji Water is premium-priced artesian water with health benefits perhaps outweighed by the questionable ethics of its bottlers, and that Nestle Pure Life is an oxymoronic name for the Nestle Company’s chemically-enhanced brand of bottled tap water. Nirvana Natural Spring Water is produced by Nirvana, Inc., a family-owned bottler based in Forestport, in the Adirondack Mountain region of New York. The Nirvana labeling is particularly interesting in that the letter “I” in Nirvana is the trunk of a tree, one side of the bottle is green and reads “Nirvana Naturally Green” and the other is blue and says, “Nirvana Positively Pure Natural Spring Water.” There are no other ingredients listed, only this: “Nestled amidst 2000 acres of untouched wilderness in the majestic Adirondack Mountains is the source that
provides Nirvana Natural Spring Water. This pristine spring water flows to the surface naturally at a constant 42 degrees, attesting to its extremely deep-rooted nature.” Is that so?

Apparently, yes. Unlike other American bottled-water companies, Nirvana does not extract its spring water mechanically; the water rises to the surface from the family’s 50 fresh-water springs by natural forces. Nirvana also doesn’t ship its water in tanks to other locations for processing and bottling. According to company vice president Mo Rafizadeh, “What our competitors do is filter tap water and purchased spring water that’s been tankered in from somewhere else. The purity [there’s that word again] of our water can’t be matched by anyone else in the country.” Personally, I’d never heard of Nirvana water until two or three years ago (it’s a relatively new brand) and decided to try it only because it was on sale for a very low price. I was quite surprised at how good it tasted; now I have a much better understanding of why it tastes so good.

Last up is Poland Spring, a giant among American bottled waters. Yes, Poland Spring is owned by Nestle; a strike against the brand in my book. We’ve all heard the jingle, “Poland Spring, coming to you straight from Maine,” and indeed, the label lists only “100% Natural Spring Water” sourced from seven springs in the state, including Poland Spring in Poland, Maine. Only about a third of the water sold by Poland Spring actually comes from Poland Spring though, and the company was the target of a class action suit for false advertising in 2003. Poland Spring allegedly sold heavily-treated common ground water as spring water, and bottled spring water from a site contaminated by an underlying refuse dump and sewage-based fertilizers. The company settled the suit later the same year, agreeing to make charitable donations and offer price discounts without admitting to any wrongdoing. My suspicion is the company believed that the quicker they settled, the less media exposure the lawsuit would receive and the sooner customers would forget about it. Am I completely jaded? Maybe, but considering that Nestle began producing Poland Spring water in 2002, I doubt it.