New Latino-Centric Product: Oleada Water

August 8, 2011
Source: Paul Kurkulis

When Paul was volunteering at a local church he noticed something that all Latino families they were serving had in common: the kids drinking habits consisted of sugared and artificially flavored beverages and almost no water. 
 
He began questioning, who was “talking” to these people in their language about healthier drinking alternatives? Who was actively marketing products to this demographic?  That’s when he came up with the idea of Oleada, indentifying an opportunity in the marketplace and with his formal education and business experience, went to work on this idea.
 

Oleada is a mineral enhanced premium bottled water, first to be designed with a Spanish language only label.  Kurkulis believes that the Hispanic vendor and consumer would appreciate a premium brand created specifically for them and in their own language.
 
However, soon after the release of Oleada many general market vendors and consumers loved the products taste and look and asked if some English language could be put on it so they too could read and enjoy this product.  Now Oleada has a bilingual label.
 
Another distinguishing factor iof Oleada is its low carbon footprint and environmentally friendly bottle. 
With FDA approved and patented bottles made from 100% recycled materials, which are fully recyclable as well.
 
Pauls indicates that if the Hispanic business community or the end Hispanic consumer cares or does not care about the environmental qualities of Oleada is not necessarily relevant to his strategy of today.  He does very much care how Hispanics think, act, shop and live, however, a priority of his business was and is to employ environmentally sound business practices both today and over time, and believes sooner or later these “best practices” and environmentally conscious implementations will be recognized and have real value for everyone.  And, if Oleada is recognized as a leader in the Hispanic business community for its environmentally sound practices, then great.
 
Time will tell if the Hispanic consumer embraces this new brand, however, so far it seems to be catching on. 
 
More interesting however is if a brand that was specifically created to bring an affordable premium Hispanic-consumer focused bottled water, will be embraced more quickly and to a greater degree by the general market consumer than by the Hispanic consumer for whom it was created.
 
According to Kurkulis’ analysis of the market, to date he has not found on any store shelf a similarly marketed and created bottled water with a focus on the Hispanic consumer and a focus on the environment, that is made entirely in the USA.