But one businessman on the Linden Soesdyke, at Adventure is receiving nature’s assistance in ensuring that his customers remain satisfy, whenever there is the need to consume a ‘tall glass of water’.
Re-migrant Cloyde Carryl, a pineapple farmer, decided to divert from pineapple farming to invest in Mora Springs, a natural spring water business, that is now a year old.
Thirty years ago Carrly bought the titled land at Adventure with a natural spring for the purposes of farming and for several years have done pineapple farming, and at one time was one of the largest suppliers of pineapple on the Highway.
Carryl explained that prior to his departure to the United States: “I knew the spring was there. But did not decide to develop it.” Carryl left Guyana for the US in the late 1980’s and re-migrated in 1995.
Armed with the desire to develop a filtered water business, over the past two years this farmer has diverted the resources from his pineapple farm to establish a water treatment factory, on a one – acre area of the farm, to filter and bottle the water, that is naturally generated by the spring.
Carryl contends that although many local bottled water manufacturers claim spring water on their lable, but the water does not really come from a spring, and notes that the Food and Drugs Department and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), has certified his water as naturally generated spring water, which is not treated with chemicals.
“It’s a natural spring water…it’s a good water,” he said, explaining that it is naturally alternated water, and natural does not mean that the water is bottled from the spring directly, without treatment, because it is filtered through double filtration of Ultraviolet (UVI) penetration at 12 gallons a minute and carbon filtered. He said that there is a common misconception that the water is bottled directly from the spring without any intervention for purity. Overseas, the process used to acquire naturally alternated water is very expensive says Carrly, but it is a natural occurrence at Mora Springs.
Natural spring water is often bottled and sold as mineral water, since minerals become dissolved in the water as it moves through the underground rocks. This may give the water flavor and even carbon dioxide bubbles, depending on the nature of the geology through which it passes and Carryl claims that the Mora Spring water is oxygenated.
In a break-down of the water filtration process, first the water is pumped from streams leading to the spring into storage tanks, then it goes through UVI filters before it follows to the bottling sinks that have nipples over the taps, to fill the five gallon bottles the water is sold in. The factory also consists of a lunch room as well as a separate security house.
CThe certificate of analysis by the Food and Drugs Department seen by Stabroek Business attest that there is no E. Coli organisms and no Coliform organisms per 100ml sample in the water. The filled bottles are then rested on pallets in the factory, before it is distributed. Each bottle is wholesale at $300 and retailed for $400. “I want to give the people the water at an affordable cost,” he remarked, in relation to the price.
Majority of the sales are done through distribution outlets or wholesale depots on Wismar and Mackenzie. Namely on Mackenzie, there is Happy on Republic Avenue, Cabs Hardware and General Store in Greenheart Street, Washie, and McRae Supermarket in Amelias’ Ward and on Wismar, Yonnett at One Mile, John at Christianburg and James and Sons on Burnham Drive. During Mora Springs’ first year it has seen its demand more than triple from 30 bottles per week to 100 bottles per week and this is growing, says Carryl.
His intention he said was to do door to door delivery but had set backs, hence the decisions to have distributors.
The next step for Mora Springs is to acquire a ‘blow up bottle machine’ that will allow the business to bottle smaller quantities. “People now getting to know the water,” was his view, since he explain that because of the slowness of the sales he is not able to become profitable as yet, but is confident that sales will continue to increase, as the benefits of spring water become known.
Carrly plans on employing four more persons to join his five member family which currently makes up the bulk of the staff along with one other person
