Water wars

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Shammas: More education is needed on a federal level to make local recycling of glass and plastic a reality.

"In terms of the overall sector, competition is getting tougher for the share of the throat in the Middle East. It's not about water any more, it's about beverages."

This statement from Sherif Saleh, regional marketing manager for Danone Premium Beverages illustrates the escalating pressure felt by local and global companies to stand out.

Category leaders are reacting to the battle for category space by entering the New Year with a flurry of category extensions, new formats and marketing campaigns in efforts to deliver trendy products and capture the attention of shoppers.

Danone launched Hayawiya Natural Mineral Water in the UAE in December, after its successful debut in Saudi Arabia, and the brand - to be priced "slightly higher than the mass market - will be available in 1.5l or 0.5l, in addition to Haywiya with Fruits at 0.33l with lemon, peach, strawberry and apple varieties.

Evian, another success story in the company's collection, currently ranks as the number one imported water in the Middle East, and the brand recently topped the leader board for water in MillwardBrown Optimor's BRANDZ Top 100 Brand Ranking, which involves interviews with more than a million consumers about almost 40,000 brands worldwide.

Saleh attributes Evian's triumph in the premium segment to it not being "processed water like many of the other brands in the market but filtered for around 15 years through permeable rocks and coming from the French Alps without any alteration" and its higher cost price to its "international standards.

If we are to compare Evian to other mass market players in the water business in supermarkets in the UAE, Danone comes third as a company and Evian comes third as a brand.

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