Outdoor Industry

Water Bottle Wars: A Dispatch from the Outdoor Retailer Show

By Alex Strickland, 8-04-10

	What the hell, exactly, is the difference? Photo by Alex Strickland.

As the outdoor industry continues to boom, companies are always looking to one-up the competition with some superlative version of shoe rubber or sweat-wicking underpants. And, in truth, it’s easy to get mired in the cycle of the latest and lightest when you’re carrying it on your back or wearing it through whatever weather or terrain comes your way. Besides, why eat one less donut when, for a scant $400, I can shave 3 oz. off my current rain coat?

Here at the Outdoor Retailer in Salt Palace, between oogling the newest fabrics and drooling over cleverly designed footwear (Hey, I’m only human; if a waterproof zipper on my ski coat snags, do I not bleed?), I couldn’t help but notice the number of water bottle booths cropping up with shocking regularity. Soon, while trying to understand the appeal of standup paddle boarding, I realized my informal count was approaching a dozen and I couldn’t help but wonder: What in the hell, exactly, is the difference?

“We have the only aluminum bottle made entirely in the USA,” said one rep.

“The stainless steel double wall design keeps drinks cold for 24 hours,” said another.

“This is the world’s first bamboo water bottle,” said the one selling a glass water bottle in a bamboo sleeve.

The competition appears to be fierce, and each bottlemaker talked a fair amount of smack about his or her competitors; everything from claiming the others were lying about a lack of harmful BPA plastics to simply disparaging a lack of creativity in the burgeoning bottle scene.

“Most of the bottles here are rip-offs,” said one spokesman who didn’t want to be named, presumably out of fear that his own bottle-shaped product might be misconstrued as copying the competition.

You certainly can’t criticize them for a lack of faith. Two of the manufacturers had essentially held the grand openings of their companies the morning the show kicked off.

Yakima, Wash.-based Liberty Bottle Works – the best-named of the bunch – crowed about distribution deals already made and a coveted spot on the cover of outdoor retailing giant REI’s holiday gift guide. Not bad for a first day’s work.

“We’ve been at this for about, uhhh, four hours,” company spokesman Ryan Clark said.

The common thread in the bottle wars was that despite the competition, the market seems to be begging for more. Every manufacturer credited the boom largely to a collective come-to-Jesus moment among American consumers that buying bottled water by the palette is bad for the environment and increasingly so for one’s reputation.

“People are realizing how wasteful bottled water is and that it’s incredibly expensive,” said Dax Kelm of Bamboo Bottles, making the thought of shelling out 25 bones for a long-term water portage solution seem like a reasonable idea. With stats like this there’s certainly a compelling argument for spending the cash.

I was beginning to feel the same twinge of self-consciousness over my ancient BPA-leeching Nalgene that I feel when I show up to the ski hill in duct tape-patched snow pants. But just then an overzealous rep referred to their offering as a “lifestyle bottle” and I remembered that sometimes you’re better off not taking a sip of the kool-aid, even if it will stay ice cold all day long.

Alex Strickland is a freelance writer in Utah. He’ll be sending reports from Outdoor Retailer all week.

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