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That article was way too long to waste my time reading, but Fiji water is delicious.

i read this article over the weekend. the first page or so mad me vow to never drink Fiji again, but by the end, you realize that the picture is a little more complicated. to be sure, Fiji has done an amazing job marketing themselves, and the water is undeniably some of the best-tasting bottled water out there. but the writer raises some very difficult questions.

they're smart in their marketing. make fiji water the choice for all who's hip, cool, and powerful, and you'll win.

in terms of the article, yeah... for traveling to fiji and exploring their plants, the article itself had very little knew information. just a lot of random stuff that was aggregated from other pieces of info you can find on the web. did she actually learn anything new when she went except learning how to get harrassed by cops in a 3rd world country? (yeah... that's a new one for any tourist...)

anyways, I've long stopped drinking fiji, and most other bottled water - especially imported bottled water. Do I really need to drink bottled water that's shipped around the world? that's ok.... my filtered tap tastes fine to me.

This is why I laugh at the self-righteous left-wing, tell me I am a horrible person for shopping at Wal-Mart or eating at McDonalds, but then suck down bottle after bottle of water produced by exploiting a nation and polluting the enviroment.

I'm not making a political statement, just telling you what my taste buds tell me. Fiji water tastes better than other water. My coworkers didn't believe me when I complained about the office switching from Crystal Rock to Poland Spring water. I held a blind taste test and everyone agreed there was a taste difference. One which I could easily identify.

Just because the bottled water industry has been stigmatized (probably rightfully so, and I drink filtered tap water 99% of the time anyway), it doesn't mean our taste buds cease to exist, and on a board mostly devoted to the enjoyment of taste I think it's a valid point to say that I prefer the taste of Fiji water to all others.

I also drink fermented grape juice shipped from all over the world. And I eat animals that consume tons of grain and produce methane gas. If you're a vegan localvore, good for you. Are you?

@schmonsequences: The different mineral contents of various waters give them different flavors. I think a lot of people would say "Water's water," but if you compare different bottled waters side by side—as I'm sure you did with your office water—you really can taste the differences among them.

Jeffrey Steingarten actually has a whole chapter about bottled water in his book The Man Who Ate Everything. He somehow establishes an ideal composition/flavor profile for water (I don't quite remember what his criteria were), then tries all the bottled waters he can get his hands on. In the end, I think he ends up declaring that Volvic is the water that most tastes like "water."

I, too, prefer Volvic to the other bottled waters I've tried (Evian, Poland Spring, Dasani, Aquafina, Fiji, Deer Park, Calistoga, and various generic brands you only find at convenience stores). But I rarely drink it anymore; with the greenfolk negging on bottled water's carbon footprint, combined with its cost, it's a convenience item I can do without. Now mostly drinking Brita-filtered tap water and the Poland Spring water from the office water cooler.

ooh. and just read the comment. there's one by the motherjones editor.