Water Coolers In Place Of The Fridge
The water cooler market has a long term future: So many people have got Pou watedr coolers now and the last quite well. There are customers who have had three water coolers over the last decade. The market will stay.
However, fridge filters have not performed as expected. Ms Hill cites the reason for this: "Fridge filters are okay if you have a large fridge, but our customers with smaller fridges found the filters didn't fit."
Another reason for this may be that Northallerton, like Bristol, is a hard water area and Brita has a basic policy that filters should be stocked according to consumers' needs. Brita general sales manager Nigel Browne explains that all water filters work the same, but have different uses.
"If somebody is concerned about their kettle scaling up, then the filter wants to sit on the worktop next to the kettle -it doesn't want to sit in the fridge," he says. "In a soft water area the kettle doesn't scale up, but the water tastes terrible because it's very acidic. So the filter will be used primarily for straight drinking water to replace bottled water. In that case we would suggest the fridge filter."
In fact Mr Browne maintains that the best way of getting the message across is through demonstrations: "The way we sold filters when they were introduced was through demonstration, which is as valid today as it ever was. A demonstration certainly creates a bit of a spark in a store."
The Kitchen Range in Llandudno is "too small and too busy" to hold a demonstration, according to proprietor Robin Whitehead. He feels suppliers need to push their message more effectively, but still reports extremely good sales of Leifheit's Aquafilter and cartridges.
Unlike the other retailers housewares spoke to, Mr Whitehead believes the Pou water coolers market does not have a long-term future: "It won't be long before we're all having our water filtered before it comes through the tap." But until that day, it is clear that there is a market for water filters, but its development is dependent upon the efforts of Brita, Boots and Waymaster.
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