Entrepreneur sells bottled New York City tap water
latimes.com
latimes.com
This is one of the best ideas i've ever heard.
On a related note, Ansari X PRIZE (for the first private space flight) was partly funded through a similar deal with an insurance company.
A bunch of crazy dot-coms were also funded with insurance policies, eg. treeloot.com (the infamous punch-the-monkey ads). Berkshire Hathaway annual reports often describe a bunch of them, as they're often the ones underwriting them.
[I then go to google up some statistics...]
http://www.golftournamenthio.com/
Yep. AIG.
If you are trying to hit a ball into a hole at a driving range, the driving range could have either longer grass that slows the ball down quicker or alternatively, it could be on concrete with artificial turf, both of which would make it harder for someone like a PGA professional to find the optimum place to hit the ball.
That being said, it would have been an interesting business prospect to try an arbitrage the contest by buying a large amount of tickets and hiring a PGA pro.
Further, there's a lot of asymmetrical information possibilities. What if a pro golfer (whose odds might be 1:500) decides to show up?
I'll call it: "Make your own bottled water"
What a bizarre situation caused by consumerism.
Tucson's tap water is pretty bad. It's chlorinated mineral water combined with a highly mineral ground water. I drink brita at home, but it's a pain on the road. However, I drink the tap here. When I go to Phoenix, I have trouble even drinking the tap, it tastes so bad in areas.
"Bottled Air: Pure, fresh air from only organic sources."
Shouldn't all tap water not need filtration? Have I been assuming too much?
If given the choice between a bottle of "spring" water and filtered water, I always go with the filtered one, because I think it generally tastes better (and more like the water I drink at home). I always find the "bottled water is just tap water" meme annoying, because it generally isn't "just tap water". It's usually water that's been through reverse osmosis filtration and had added salts. That's like saying that spring water is just rain water found in your local puddle.
A trip back to New York last year was a real treat for the water alone.
"If you don't use a water filter, your body is the water filter"
(I'm from Tasmania, and I've never seen it -- I suspect you can only buy it in L.A.)
People shouldn't be surprised by the bottled water phenomenon. You are buying the bottle, not the water, and a bottle is often worth $1.
When did CA ban bottles?
Or, did they just take water out of the vending machines and cancel water cooler contracts for the peons?
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