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BY TOM BELL
Blethen Maine Newspapers 03/28/2008

Blethen Maine Newspapers

Tom Cushman remembers years ago when his old friend Jimmy Peterson told him that people would pay good money for water in bottles.

"I said, 'You are nuts?' " Cushman recalled. "Why are you going to buy water when water is free?' "

A few months ago, Peterson came to Cushman with another idea: bottled water for pets. And this time, Cushman not only listened but became an investor.

Cushman and Peterson are part of a Westbrook start-up company called Aqua Plus that is selling bottled water for dogs and cats.

The strawberry-flavored beverage is bottled by Oakhurst Dairy and is being sold for $2.99 a gallon in several stores in Maine and New Hampshire.

But there's competition out there. Major soda companies and small boutique outfits around the country are selling pet water, with flavorings such as chicken and peanut butter.

Aqua Plus hopes to maneuver through a crowded field by offering a product that has fewer medical ingredients and aims to appeal to animals' palates, rather than cure their ailments.

The product appeals to the kind of people who buy toys for their dogs because they don't think a stick is good enough, explained Wendy Peterson, Jimmy Peterson's daughter-in-law.

She said that many people these days treat their pets like children and want only the best for them.

"People want their pets to be healthy, and they want to give them the best because they love them," she said. "That's why I think this product is going to go over well." The product is 99.9 percent water. The source of the filtered and purified water is Sebago Lake, via the Portland Water District.

The label lists organic strawberry flavoring, antioxidants, glucosamine, selenium, and vitamins A, C and E.

The water is sold in clear plastic jugs and is intended to be used at home.

The company also is developing a product called the "hydration station." It will feature a container that can double as portable water dish.

The company is selling its water under the Aqua Plus label but will be changing the to Puralite because of trademark issues.

Jimmy Peterson's son, Rich Peterson, is marketing the water.

The majority shareholders are Jim Talbot, a commercial real estate developer in South Portland, and Cushman, a manager of an affiliated electrical contracting company, Associated Electric.

Talbot and Cushman have invested about $150,000 so far, Cushman said.

The company is still testing its marketing effort and hasn't ramped up production enough to earn any profits.

But it already has developed some loyal customers.

Dan Thibeault of Westbrook said his yellow Labrador retriever, Digga, drinks a lot more water now that he's pouring Aqua Plus in the water bowl.

Thibeault and Digga participated in field tests during which Digga was given Aqua Plus water for 30 days and ordinary bottled water for 30 days.

"I tell you, my boy loves it," Thibeault said. "He does go to it more often than regular bottled water."

Ten families participated in the studies. Katahdin Laboratories in Scarborough analyzed the water.

Rich Peterson said he decided to use the strawberry flavoring because many dog owners at pet shows use berry flavorings to encourage their dogs to drink water.

To humans, the water tastes bland because there's no sugar. But for a dog or cat, Peterson said, the water tastes like a "beautiful bouquet" of strawberry flavoring.

Peterson said he recognizes that most people aren't going to give bottled water to their pets To turn his fledging company into a multimillion dollar enterprise, he said, he doesn't need to capture the whole market. He only needs a tiny sliver of a huge market that has been growing rapidly. In 2007, pet owners spent $41 billion on their pets, up 6 percent from the previous year.

The Petersons are not the first to come up with the idea of bottled water for pets.

A Washington company called PetRefresh sells water from "high mountain streams of unusual purity, clarity and beneficial mineral contents."

Cott Corp. has introduced FortiFido, which comes in four different flavors: peanut butter, parsley, spearmint and lemongrass.

Avery Beverages of Massachusetts has launched Woof Water. Flavors include toxic slime, dog drool, swamp juice and bug barf.

Dog Ventures LLC of West Palm Beach, Fla., sells "DogWater" in containers that double as throwing toys. A company called K9 Water Inc. in Valencia, Calif., has sold "Gutter Water" and chicken-flavored "Toilet Water."

Rich Peterson said his competitors are selling water that has too many ingredients, requiring pet owners to monitor how much water their pets drink.

He said Aqua Plus is being marketed as a "staple" that pets can drink every day, as much as they want. The company does not make any health claims except to say that water encourages pets to drink more water and that many pets don't drink enough.

"The sad fact is that most animals live in a perpetual state of dehydration," the company says in a brochure for customers, titled, "SOLVING THE DEHYDRATION EPIDEMIC."

The product is sold at Pet Quarters stores in Scarborough, Auburn, Falmouth and Newington, N.H. It is also sold at the Pet Pantry in Freeport and Colucci's Market and Moran's Market in Portland.

Chris Parker, owner of the Pet Pantry, said he has heard positive feedback from customers.

"The people have been saying that the dogs really enjoy it," he said. "My feeling of it is that it can never hurt."

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