I am actually ashamed to admit this, I haven’t thought about or said the word thermos in years! Immediately saying the word takes me right back to the good ol’ days of elementary school when my mom would give me a thermos full of juice in my lunch box…not a bottle of water. And then when the juice was gone, I would fill it up with (gasp) water from the drinking fountain …you know that drinking fountain that is full of free water! When did that stop for everyone?

Thermoses are amazing and have been around for years but for some reason (massive amounts of advertising from the bottled water industry) they have been put on the back burner. Until now, Thermos has  created a super practical iPhone App that will guide users to drinking fountains!  How awesome is that? The FREE Oasis Places app will guide users to the closest drinking fountain and allow them to rank and post photos. It’s like Yelp for drinking fountains. Just one more way to further remove bottled water from everyday life. I love that this app tackles two major points – bringing your own multi-use bottle and bringing back the tap.

Rick Dias, President at Thermos said “Thermos has been making products that help people lead healthier lifestyles for over a century….we want to make it easier than ever to enjoy a refreshing and healthy drink of cold water.” Awesome job!

Ready more here and visit Thermos to start filling up those reusable bottles…just like the good ol’ days.

For a few months, National Geographic has dedicated a section on their website to Fresh Water topics – including the implications of bottled water. They recently added an interview with Peter Gleick, author of Bottled and Sold: The Story Behind Our Obsession with Bottled Water. The points he makes are not altogether new but the facts are and it is definitely an interesting, quick read from an expert on bottled water waste.  He suggests that there are four reasons that bottled water grew in popularity:

1. Convenience
2. Disappearance of Drinking Fountains
3. Fear of Tap Water
4. Aggressive Marketing of Bottled Water and Against Tap Water

Read More: National Geographic: The Business of Bottled Water

Also, check out the National Geographic Fresh Water Section

The results are in!

When asked the question: Has your bottled water consumption changed over time? 35.7% of the respondents say they don’t use it all, 33.4% said they use less than they use to! That’s great news, and even better news for the environment. Here are the full results – Question of the Day

Join the conversation! Today, the Wall Street Journal asked: Has your consumption of bottled water changed over time? This Question of the Day is super important to see if people have taken the jump and are truly reducing their bottled water usage.  We think everyone should add their response and input:

Wall Street Journal: Question of the Day

We’ll post the results tomorrow!

Caron, a yarn company, has a really cool product that is helping reduce the waste from plastic bottles. Their Simply Soft Eco yarn is a blended yarn that is 80% regular yarn material and 20% specially processed fiber produced from recycled plastic bottles!  The yarn even has a special quality – some of the dark color yarn actually has unique white flecks dispersed throughout the yarn aka the result of the plastic bottles. They claim that every 10 balls of yarn (or skein for those in the knitting know) saves 6 plastic bottles from the trash.  With sales so far, Caron has saved almost 1.5million plastic bottles from landfills! Check out more here – Caron

Here at Ban the Bottle we hope that you are making everyday Earth Day by curbing your usage of bottled water and promoting multi-use bottles. We know that we are making a difference and that’s because of you! Little efforts help make big results and if we can cut the 60 million bottles consumed each year by even a little bit… it’s a success. Have a great Earth Day and continue to BAN THE BOTTLE!!

This article brings up such a great point, not only is single-use bottled water wasteful it’s all incredibly spendy! With departments and libraries and campus services being closed it is shocking that no one thought to stop paying for water when it comes out of the spout for practically nothing! Read more about the University of California and their bottled water obsession – Despite Budget Woes, University Still Has Money for Bottled Water

Wow, way to show faith in your own city water.  Again, it is important to lead by example.   This has to stop, government money should not be spent on unnecessary items such as BOTTLED WATER unless it is an emergency…and then it wouldn’t be unnecessary! I wonder if the Colorado Water Authority has bottles of water in their office….

Read the full article here – Colorado Spent Over $150k on Bottled Water Last Year