Bottled water and corporate social responsibility
3 min read
If you are running any kind of business – large or small – you are almost certain to want to offer your staff, your clients and your visitors water to drink.
Since so much of the water that is drunk in those situations these days comes in plastic bottles, you might immediately face the dilemma of your offer sitting uncomfortably with the image of corporate social responsibility (CSR) of your firm.
Why is that? And how might you counter it?
Corporate social responsibility
The website The Balance, on the 7th of October 2019, offered a handy definition of corporate social responsibility and why it has become an essential part of the image or brand which companies want to project in the modern world.
CSR demonstrates how a business incorporates social and environmental concerns into its day to day activities and overall corporate mission. It is effectively a way for the company to announce its commitment to making the world a better place.
That means finding clear objectives in mitigating or reducing the company’s negative environmental footprint in all that it does. Through this expression of doing “the right thing”, the company might enhance its public relations, make its customers and workforce happier, and ultimately improve its financial performance.
Bottled water
So, how does the simple act of offering something as simple as bottles of water impact your projected image of CSR?
The plastic commonly used to bottle water is typically PET – polyethylene terephthalate.
A story in the Telegraph newspaper last year explained that although the situation is improving slightly, still only around a quarter of all such plastic is recycled. The PET used in manufacturing a bottle for water is effectively single-use, with the container going to landfill – or simply discarded at the roadside – rather than being recycled.
You may do a lot to enhance your CSR by completely avoiding any such environmental damage by dispensing with the use of plastic bottles of water altogether.
For the price of a relatively modest investment in a filtered water system, you may bottle your own fresh, purified and great-tasting still or sparkling in-house, using reusable glass bottles. Bottled water from such a system immediately boosts your CSR credentials in the eyes of staff, clients and visitors to your firm’s premises.
What is more, that promotion of your CSR may be highlighted even more. The bottles you use can be personalised with your company logo – and perhaps a reminder of the sustainability of glass in place of plastic bottles – to drive home the message you want to convey.
Not only does an in-house system for bottling fresh water help to establish your CSR, but it may also save you money – and bolster your bottom line into the bargain. It has been shown that such a system may be up to half the price of buying in crates of water in plastic bottles – not to mention the valuable storage space such purchases invariably take up.
By simultaneously boosting your CSR and saving money, your in-house water bottling system is likely to pay for itself in no time at all.
