Napoleon once famously said, “Water, air, and cleanliness are the chief articles in my pharmacy.” He isn’t much different from many of the people we surveyed about their beverage preferences provided at their workplace. When we asked what is the most important part of beverages served at the office, the top two responses were associated with cleanliness and availability.
And before you start thinking water and beverage services don’t matter to employees, we asked them about that too: just like maintaining a safe work environment, providing clean water does contribute to the productivity of an office or job site.
For managers and business owners the results were more technical. They wanted to be certain the water was clean and that the machine used to dispense it was also clean and easy to use. Interestingly, both managers and employees alike said that availability was a large decision point. That’s interesting because the traditional bottled water cooler is actually designed to run out of availability on a regular basis! Unless, of course, you have a stockpile of bottles and someone ready and willing to change it.
What are the alternatives? One alternative gaining popularity is the point-of-use (POU) water cooler. This solution connects a filtration system directly to the facility’s water supply—and then purifies it on the spot.
Right off the bat you can visualize fewer empty bottles piling up and a closet full of something other than bottles of water, right? That’s not the only reason, nor the most important reason to consider a POU system. Just imagine the constant 24-7 availability of fresh and clean water untouched by anyone – even the Good Samaritan changing the bottle. Now that’s reason in itself to ditch the bottle and convert to a POU.
That said, the extra space and elimination of delivery and maintenance schedules is nothing to scoff at. Consider this: an office of 30 people can use about 15 five-pound bottles a month. If it takes five to ten minutes to replace each bottle, you’ve lost a few hours each month just to keep water flowing in your office. Further, the 15 bottles delivered every month can weigh over 600lbs and take up to 100 square feet of space! If you are paying $11 a square foot for your office, that’s an extra $1,100 a year just to store water.
A point-of-use system streamlines the delivery of clean and fresh water, utilizes existing resources and does not demand attention on a regular basis. By putting one to work in your office, you can save thousands of dollars a year while making sure the water is clean and ready to use.