fiji (fiji, still, available nationally)

what a grand idea: get water from a country that itself conjures images of pristine beaches and sunny days, and simply remind us of that each time we buy a bottle. while the water we're drinking is not actually from said beaches, the crispness of this delicious 7.5ph liquid implies it should be (kind of in that way that everything on the denny's menu doesn't actually look like the pictures on the menu, but all of the options nonetheless taste like the pictures imply they should [we are of course not directly comparing fiji to something that would be served at denny's {not to insult the home of the big texas BBQ burger...}]).

packaging 4/10:
(this rating may be changing soon, as the fiji company has begun a massive environmental overhaul)
the environment lover in me wants to give this a 1/10, but the guy who respects a well thought out image bumps this up to a 4.
besides just having an incredibly inefficient shape, the fiji bottle rapes (and pillages) the environment in its production and shipping. each 1L bottle requires 6.7L of water to produce. they're cooked up at a 24-hour diesel fuel-run plan in china before being shipped to the filling plant in fiji (where they are then shipped--individually full of water--to various destinations).
still, the image is hard to beat. the clear front label of this perfectly smooth, rectangular bottle is scantily clad, with the main image being on the reverse of the back's label, letting the consumer view the image through the pristinely clear water. before even taking a sip we're reminded of how refreshingly pure this experience is about to be (the anti-dasani).

taste 9/10:
clean, crisp, and smooth, and perpetually refreshing, fiji's bite matches its bottle's smooth, rectangular bark.

clarity 10/10:
the bottle design begs you to disagree; arguing with this would be like starting a fight with mike tyson just because he told you that you could have the first shot.

trendiness 9/10:
while voss may be king of the convenience store, most of the michelin restaurants i frequent are still fiji fans (with apparently-custom rectangular ice buckets in tow). if their horrid environmental record becomes more public before they have a chance to curb it, though, fiji may be facing a tough road ahead with the increasing popularity of concern these days.

value 9/10:
depending on where you go, the price of fiji is usually fairly equal to our two previously-reviewed bottles, evian and volvic. fiji's online stats are a bit weird: the website we use for reference lists a 12 pack of 1Ls at 21.99--which is much less than the equivalent of the other premiums we've reviewed--but a 24-pack of .5L fiji bottles goes for 23.96, one cent more than the equivalently bottled amount of volvic. we can only assume that the difference is due to the price of producing a fiji bottle, as packaging 12Ls of water in 24 bottles is much more plastic than packaging that same water in 12 bottles, no matter how you slice it. basically, if you're going for large sizes or bulk, the larger the bottle the better the value for fiji. if you're at the supermarket, though, each bottle will probably run you around the same for any of the premiums, so the choice is yours.

overall:
the feej's horrid packaging score, due strictly to environmental factors, prevents this bottle from earning stellar marks. the same issues that lead to these environmental problems also cause a higher price-per-bottle to the consumer. once the company's packaging process is overhauled, fiji might just find itself floating to the top of the bottled water market. now we have to see if high-end consumers are alright with purchasing a product that does not kill the environment (do hummers come with square cupholders?).

41/50

ideal for: charlie trotter, those of us who just spent a grueling day at work...you know...crunching numbers and blogging n' stuff, people without arthritis, stupid n00bs who lurv making sure the environment gets McPwn'd before our kids are born