There are more than 800 million people who lack access to clean water worldwide. It is a major problem that has plagued society for generations, yet entrepreneur Josh Cliffords came up with a way to help solve this problem. Cliffords is the founder of FreeWater, the world’s first free beverage company. Based in Texas, FreeWater makes cartons of water with advertisements on them, allowing the company to give away free, clean drinking water. Advertisers can buy ad space on these water bottles (the cost of which is dependent on several factors of cost for the company) and present their product to customers in a non-aggressive way. Advertisers can also link QR codes to their advertisements, allowing people to receive coupons, order food, register to vote, and even download movies, music, and T.V. shows.
FreeWater strives to “make people happy by saving them money, saving lives and helping the environment,” according to PR Newswire, “Additionally, FreeWater advertisers get 10 times the impressions of direct mail; the company’s potential profit margins are also much higher than traditional food and beverage companies, being a media and e-commerce platform.” FreeWater also creates partnerships with non-profit organizations, such as church groups, sports programs, and schools. These organizations can buy advertising space and FreeWater will give them between 10 and 25 cents per beverage bought. The company intends to take this concept even further in the future, currently developing the world’s first free supermarket. According to the company’s website, they “have created a handful of processes that will enable the free and profitable distribution of nearly every type of product that can be purchased in COSTCO today.” You can read more about them on prnewswire.com or on their website, freewater.io.
While the idea of free stuff sounds great, I don’t know if they’ll get past water. Food is much more expensive to procure than water, so using just advertising may not be enough. In addition, it removes some of the profit incentive possibly resulting in lower quality products. If they could find a way to make a free supermarket while solving these problems, it would be amazing!
Great article to read. I wasnt aware of this company and found it interesting to read what its all about. Its a very smart idea to use advertisement to make the water free. Thats something you don’t usually see on a product rather that is implicated on a free service like a app. Overall I enjoyed the article.