Starting a Bottled Water Business Using Tap Water

More people these days buy bottled water than bottled soda. The global market for bottled water is accelerating fast, while the global market for soda is ebbing. Many business experts predict that globally, bottled water would overtake bottled soda in terms of market size.

In fact, according to an old 2017 article by CBS, bottled water overtook soda as the number one drink in America. This is according to the consulting firm Beverage Marketing Corporation.

It’s also now 2023, and a lot of people know that many of the bottled water being commercially sold is nothing but tap water. Health experts in the US have determined that even the biggest water bottling companies are bottling tap water.

Also, bottled water is sold at a much bigger markup than bottled soda, making them more profitable to sell, although they are cheaper to produce.

With all these details presented, it is safe to assume that you have a high chance of earning a lot of money if you sell bottled water, even though it is just bottled tap water.

Here are a few steps to starting one:

The information in this article is based off our experience retailing bottled water and from observing no brand bottled water sellers.

The Details:

1. Make a Business Plan

Although filling up plastic bottles with tap water and selling them may look simple, easy and cheap, you need to remember that its still a business that requires capital and customers:

1.1 Can You Afford a Bottled Tap Water Business?

Although your product is only tap water, it still needs to be sanitized, bottled, labeled, sealed, packed and delivered. But you don’t need to spend a lot of money at the onset. You can basically buy these two cheap machines and supplies and you’re already in business:

- Water Purifier System: You need this machine to filter out any impurities in your tap water. I found one online being sold for as cheap as USD 30.00 .

- Electric Handheld Capping Machine: You need this to seal your bottled water so no bacteria or any other impurities can enter it. I found one online being sold for as cheap as USD 65.00 .

- Plastic Labels: There are many custom label printing services online. I found companies in Alibaba selling them for USD 0.01 cents a piece.

- Disposable Plastic Bottles: There are many disposable plastic bottle sellers online. I found companies in Alibaba selling them for USD 0.01 cents a piece.

As you can see, for a very minimal cost, you can already start a bottled water business right in your own home. Of course, you would have to factor in packaging and delivery costs, but even with these added on, you still stand to make a lot of profit for each bottled water you sell.

1.2 What’s The Name of Your Bottled Tap Water Product?:

You’re basically selling a simple and basic product which is water, which is already being sold by a lot of other companies. That’s why you need to make your bottled water products stand out, even in name only.

Remember also that legally, a product must have a name that is not similar to an already existing product name. You can check online to see if your intended product name is already being used.

A good name to associate to your bottled water product would be words related to health, purity and even something exotic, although there are customers who frown at exotically named bottled water products.

This is because for the most part, they know it didn’t come from an exotic place. Usually, you’d have better luck naming your bottled water product after health and purity, which is something most customers want to associate with the bottled products they buy.

1.3 Who’s Your Target Market?:

Your business strategy and even success would largely depend on your target market. For example, there is a multitude of bottled water sellers. Most of them do not advertise, but rather target markets that are least served by the most popular bottled water brands.

For example, there are small unbranded bottled water companies who supply catering companies. This is beneficial to both parties:

The catering company gets to access very cheap bottled water, while the unbranded bottled water company have exclusive access to the customers of the catering companies.

There are many other things you need to plan before starting your bottled water business: How much is the price of your bottled water? What’s your market territory?, And so on. It is suggested that you study other bottled water sellers to see how they started and succeeded.

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2. What’s Your Business Structure?

Unless you’re being funded by bigtime investors, it’s best to start out small and see if your bottled water business would thrive.

This way, you wouldn’t have to spend a lot of capital, time and other resources just to see if your bottled water business would be a success. At least if your small business fails, you just lost a little bit of capital, time and other resources.

If your small bottled water business turns out to be a success, this might be the only time you consider upscaling.

You can take on partners and upscale to a partnership, upscale to a limited liability company or LLC, and if you really want to have a big company, you can upscale to a corporate business structure.

Establishing a legal business structure such as an LLC or corporation protects you from being personally held responsible if your bottled water business gets sued.

This means that your personal property cannot be seized and used to pay for any financial reparations as a result of you being successfully sued by someone.

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3. Register Your Business

Depending on the business laws of the country where you’re operating your bottled water business, for your bottled water business to legally exist, it must first be registered with either local or state government.

For the most part in poor and developing countries, you’ll only need a business permit in order to start manufacturing and selling your bottled water.

But for developed countries who have stricter business health laws, you might need to register for additional permits and licenses.

For example, if you’re operating your bottled water business in the USA, you might need to have “Good Manufacturing Practices (GMPSs)”, “Standards of Identify”, and labeling requirements.

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4. Open a Bank Account

Most businesses today buy and/or pay using bank card payments. This includes both your customers and suppliers. This is the reason why your bottled water business must also have the capability to both pay and accept bank card payments.

This is especially true if your customer is buying huge quantities of bottled water from you, or if you’re ordering a huge quantity of supplies from your suppliers. This is especially true if your suppliers are from overseas.

Also, at some point, you might need to apply for a bank loan. Having a record with a bank although it might just be a regular savings account can help with your bank loan application.

Although you have to pay more, applying for a business bank account can greatly improve your business. For one, it helps you to separate your normal savings from your business savings. Secondly, if you get sued, it is usually only your business bank account that is compromised.

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5. Setup Your Accounting

A small bottled water business is a relatively simple business. You can do your own accounting and later just hire a real accountant to balance your accounting books and file them with the government, including your taxes.

This way, you don’t have to pay for a full-time accountant which can be a very big expense for you, especially if you’re just starting out with your bottled water business and have little capital to spare.

Almost everyone has had some accounting lessons at one point in their schooling, so this setup is entirely possible. There are even free accounting courses online that you can learn from, especially in YouTube.

The importance of properly recording and filing your financial records cannot be overemphasized. That’s why even if you hate accounting, you need to learn it you are running any sort of business, to know the financial standing of your bottled water business.

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6. Get Insurance

Depending on the size of your bottled water business, you might need to get business insurance for it at some point.

Insurance might seem a useless expense, but you won’t know of its importance until you actually need it.

But it’s understandable if you don’t get insurance when you’re just starting out with your bottled water business. This is because usually when you’re just starting out, your capital is limited. Your capital is better spent on other basic expenses than insurance at the onset.

But as soon as you can afford insurance, you should definitely get one. This is because you never know when the next accident, calamity and other business catastrophes might happen.

This is especially true as your bottled water business grows, this is because the more your business grows, the more you stand to lose. For example, even a small theft can basically ruin your business. That is why even theft is covered by insurance.

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7. Promote Your Business Online

These days, most commercial transactions happen online. This is especially true with the popularity of e-commerce and online shopping.

You might have a physical store where you sell your bottled water, but its online where you have the greatest possibility to increase your market share.

With a physical store, your customers would usually come from the immediate and outlying areas near your physical store. But with an online store, your have a potential global customer reach.

Also, you have more marketing leverage when you have an online presence. You can send emails and interact with your potential customers in social media. If you have the money, you can even pay to have your bottled water products advertised.

You can blog, write articles, guest post, make videos promoting your bottled water business and so on.

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8. Call Your Potential Customers

Although online marketing is very popular and effective these days, directly calling your potential customers can still probably yield you good results.

This is because voice to voice interactions are more personal than online interactions. Potential customers who would probably disregard your online marketing pitches would probably be more accommodating to you if you call them directly.

Also, there are still a lot of people who were born before the age of computers and the internet. As of 2023, there are still billions of people who are at this age range. Usually, these people are already occupying supervisory or managerial positions in their company.

In short, although they might not be tech savvy as compared to their younger counterparts, they usually hold the decision-making positions in the company. They usually still conduct their business interactions using the telephone.

If you are skilled in telephone marketing, there is a good chance that you’ll get to interact with these senior decision makers, enabling you to sell your bottled water products to their company.

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Final Words

You don’t have to spend a lot of money to start a bottled water business, especially if you’re bottling tap water which many big water bottle manufacturers are already doing.

You can be a one-man business bottling, packaging and delivering your bottled water products. Of course, you can’t produce much bottled water if you’re just a one-man business with simple cheap machines.

But you can start out as one just to test if you would succeed in selling your bottled water products. If you do succeed, then you can decide to upscale your bottled water business.

But the beauty of a bottled water business is this: water does not expire. You can indefinitely stock water and sell it.

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