MONTELLIER

• Montellier is a sparkling mineral drinking water brand sourced in Quebec, Canada.
• The sparkling water brand is bottled in Quebec by the Alex Coulombe ltée family business. 
• Montellier's primary way of marketing their products is by publishing posts, such as high-quality photos of their sparkling waters and short videos, on its Instagram and Facebook pages.
• Montellier's sparkling drinking water comes in three flavors: unflavored, natural lime, and lemon essence.
• In terms of competitive advantage, Montellier sparkling water received a prestigious international award, the Monde Grand Gold Selection Medal, for the quality of the sparkling water.
• Montellier also changed the design of its bottles to competitive, sales-boosting, and award-winning deep blue packages.
• The newly redesigned package doubled its sales, gave it a leg up over their competitors, and won the company design and packaging awards.

PERRIER

• In June 2017, Perrier organized a marketing and advertising event dubbed 'Perrier Hot Air Balloons' to show its customers the features of any Perrier Sparkling Mineral water.
• As a marketing strategy, Perrier incentivizes its customers by organizing customer treats and offering the first 120 guests a free bottle of a Perrier beverage.
• Perrier Canada's most preferred marketing channel is Instagram.
• The company posted photos of its products, video ads, events, alongside carefully selected hashtags.
• Given the effectiveness of accompanying Instagram posts with relevant hashtags, Perrier's use of hashtags on its posts gives it a competitive advantage when it comes to brand awareness.
•  Perrier products include Perrier Carbonated Natural Spring Water, Perrier With Natural Flavors, and Perrier & Juice.
• One weakness of Perrier, according to Dr. Mark Wolff, a dentistry professor, is that the water is more acidic than other fizzy drinks since it has a pH of 5.8 compared to the average pH of 6.8 of other fizzy drinks.
• According to consumer reviews of Perrier sparkling water on Influenster, most consumers think that Perrier sparkling natural water is more expensive than other brands.
• Other customers said they did not like the taste but these are consumers who have never tasted sparkling carbonated water before and therefore did not know what to expect.

MOUNTAIN VALLEY SPARKLING WATER

• Mountain Valley Sparkling Water is sourced from a spring in the Ouachita Mountains in the US.
• Their sparkling water products include Mountain Valley Sparkling Water, Blackberry Pomegranate Sparkling, and White Peach Sparkling.
• Mountain Valley Sparkling Water has a leg up over its competitors as the company walked away with two gold medals and one bronze medal during the 29th edition of Berkeley Springs International Water Tasting.
• Since Mountain Valley Springs Company is based in the United States, its sparkling water is distributed to the Canadian market by Cedar Springs.
• Mountain Valley Sparkling Water is available in Canada only in glass bottles. This may be a weakness as it limits a customer's options, but the company maintains that glass is "the safest and most durable food-grade material available."
• Mountain Valley Water leverages Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter to promote brand awareness and market its products.

SAN PELLEGRINO

• This Nestle Waters brand mostly uses Facebook for its marketing efforts.
• Through its YouTube Channel, SanPellegrino TV, the company markets its sparkling water and encourages its customers to discover their taste experiences.
• San Pellegrino's sparkling water is available in the original San Pellegrino flavor as well as the exciting San Pellegrino Essenza that comes in three flavors: Dark Morello Cherry & Pomegranate, Lemon & Lemon Zest, and Tangerine & Wild Strawberry.
• The original San Pellegrino flavor is bottled in glass, PET, or Magnum bottles and available in 250 ml, 500 ml, 750 ml, and 1,000 ml bottles.
• According to San Pellegrino's Head of International Relations, the red star on its logo gives it "subliminal advantage over the competition" because consumers believe that red stars are a mark of quality.
• This assertion is corroborated with research by psychologists from Oxford University who realized, after ten years of research, that "incorporating a star into a design helps connote the arousing experience of drinking carbonated water."
• On Influenster, most disgruntled customers drank the sparkling drink for the first time, and it never appealed to them as they only wanted to taste it to understand why there was so much hype around it.
• The projected annual revenue from sparkling water in Canada is $309 million by 2019.

RESEARCH STRATEGY

CANADIAN DEMOGRAPHICS

• In summary, Canada has 27,391,890 people between the ages of 20 and 79, with 13,638,919 men and 13,752,971 women.
• The Age and Gender tab of the attached spreadsheet has detailed demographic information on the Canadian population by age and gender; the Marital Status tab has demographic information on marital status; while the Province tab has population statistics by province.
• The attached Google Doc has infographics on selected information from Stats Can on education and income.
•  Two-thirds of adult Canadians have a post-secondary education.
• The median income in Canada is CAD 57,000.

LINKING SPARKLING WATER TO HEALTH AND WELLNESS

• According to Canadian Grocer, "the carbonated water category taps into several health and wellness trends popular with Canadians today, such as the appeal of a low-carbohydrate and low-calorie option that can potentially be a low-guilt beverage. For carbonated water, innovation is fueling the growth with more flavors and formats available to Canadians."

QUANTITATIVE INFORMATION EXTRAPOLATION

• According to Agriculture Canada, for 68% of consumers, preventing further health issues in a top priority; followed closely by 63% who want to look and feel good. Increasing water intake has been identified as a way to reach those goals.
• Since there are 27,391,890 people between the ages of 20 and 79 in Canada, about 18,626,485 [68% of 27,391,890] Canadians aged 20-79 are potential customers for sparkling water.
•  52% of the Canadians surveyed rank beverage choice as making an important contribution to their health and wellness needs. Therefore, about 14,243,782 [52% of 27,391,890] Canadians aged 20-79 think beverages are an important factor in maintaining good health.
• These preferences encourage sustained growth for the health and wellness sector in Canada.

QUALITATIVE SURVEY RESULTS

• According to Pearl Strategy's reports based on a Canada-wide survey, Millennials have a stronger commitment to eating healthier, improving sleep, and avoiding/reducing stress. One can, therefore, assume that Millennials are a large consumer segment for sparkling water.
• Being healthy is very important to Millennials as they say it makes life more cheerful, provides them with vitality, and gives them balance and an advantage. All these concepts could be used to target Millennials in advertising.
• Millennials rated beverages as effective in pursuing health and wellness.
• The growing urban population is one of the key factors triggering the growth of the market.

OTHER INFORMATION

• The size of the health and wellness market is expected to reach USD 20.6 billion in 2022 from USD 14.9 billion in 2013.
• According to Robert Carter, an industry adviser with NPD Group, demand for sparkling water in Canada has been "exploding," with more consumers moving away from the alcohol category and the carbonated soft drink category.

INTERESTING NEW PRODUCTS:

#1: SodaStream

•  SodaStream is known as the maker of the consumer home carbonation product for consumers. The device carbonates water by adding carbon dioxide from a pressurized cylinder to create soda water to drink.
• With sales growing by nearly 50% in 2018, Canada has become a major market for SodaStream. The company claims to have sold 1.5 million machines in Canada since 2010, making Canada its fourth-largest market in the world, behind Germany, the US, and France.

#2: Sweet Reason

• The company describes its product as a "premium sparkling water infused with 7mg of a unique form of CO2-extracted CBD."
• Its cannabidiol (CBD) is water-soluble, and its drinks don't contain sugar, sweeteners, sodium, carbs, or artificial ingredients.
• "The company sources its cannabinoid extract from a hemp grower in Colorado and uses a co-packing facility for bottling and distribution."

RESEARCH STRATEGY

FINDINGS

• It was seen in Nielsen's 2017 report for Canada that although in terms of total volume sales flat water in Canada was still leading the charts, in terms of growth carbonated water far surpassed flat water as well as other categories, such as coconut water.
• For the 52 weeks ending on April 1, 2017, the sales of flat water grew by 4% year-over-year (YoY) in terms of sales in dollar value and by 6% YoY in terms of sales in liter volume.
• Meanwhile, in the same time period, the sales of carbonated water grew by 17% YoY both in terms of sales in dollar value and sales in liter volume.
• Other categories such as coconut water witnessed a growth of 4% and 3% YoY for sales in dollar value and sales in liter volume, respectively, in the same span of time.
• This preference towards carbonated/sparkling water was not a one-year phenomenon, considering that the same phenomenon was found to have gained momentum between 2014 and 2015 as well.
• Between 2014 and 2015, flat water sales in Canada were up 2% in dollars, while carbonated water sales were up 8% in dollars and a significant 21% in units.

• Overall, the increase in consumption and sales across all categories of water is driven by the fact that almost three-fourths (73%) of Canadians actively trying to lose weight are choosing to drink more water.
• Now, with carbonated water being the highest-growth category in water overall, as seen from the findings above, it can be reasonably assumed to be driven by this factor of health-consciousness.
• This fact was also validated by Condé Nast considering that the publication noted in 2019 that Canadians were "slowly but surely migrating to a healthier alternative with sparkling water consumption being consistently on the rise."

• As early as in 2015, it was found that consumers of sparkling water in Canada were often motivated by taste along with other factors such as craving and relaxation.
• The primary market for carbonated and sparkling water is composed of 25 to 40-year-old “social trendsetters who are online, in-the-know and looking for something unexpected,” according to Jennifer Semley-Robert of Nestlé Waters.
• To cater to this above-mentioned demographic, Nestlé Waters added a variant "Perrier L’Orange to its fold of flavoured water varieties," corroborating the demand for varieties in the carbonated/sparkling water category.
• In a 2018 report, this piqued interest was validated as an ongoing trend one since it noted that "sales in the sparkling water category increased 17 per cent from last year, primarily attributed to new companies and new flavour offerings into the market."
• The popular flavors of carbonated water in Canada were grapefruit, lemon, strawberry, and cucumber.

RESEARCH STRATEGY:

• "Sparkling water" is produced from a spring or well that naturally contains dissolved carbon dioxide. Therefore, by its very inherent nature sparkling natural spring water was the same as Sparkling Water.
• Also, when plain water met carbon dioxide, it became carbonated or “sparkling.” And therefore, Sparkling Water, which was sparkling natural spring water, could also be called carbonated water.