Anyone who’s read Elizabeth Royte‘s Bottlemania will be cheered by this news, from BrandWeek:

The market for bottled water may be drying up.

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Despite massive discounting, brands like Aquafina and Poland Spring are experiencing a sales drought unlike any the category has ever seen. After almost a decade of triple and then double-digit growth, sales volume grew less than 1% for the first half of the year, per Beverage Digest, Bedford Hills, N.Y.

The chief culprit: the economy. Shoppers are less interested in paying for a product that they can get for free.

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