Letter: Critics don’t make sense (July 10, 2008)
Editor:
In 1975 I started Cummings Market in West Kennebunk and ran it for more than 20 years, then I sold it and retired in 1996. Running a small convenience store requires you to know and serve the people in the area pretty well. You have to sell stuff people want and keep your costs down so you can keep prices as low as possible.
When I read about the Kennebunk, Kennebunkport and Wells Water District’s plan to sell water to Poland Spring I guess they are just trying to do the same thing. They want to keep providing water to the area but keep their costs down by selling some extra water for Poland Spring to put in a bottle. But I am surprised that so many people are complaining about it and their arguments just don’t make sense.
For example, they complain that people are buying too much bottled water. At my old store we had a cooler that was about 24 feet long and only about two shelves of the whole cooler was for selling bottled water. That was because we sold a whole lot more beer, soda, ice tea and other drinks than we sold bottled water. If you wanted to complain about what people are drinking I would think you would start with all those other drinks that use a lot more water to make in the first place, use bottles too but aren’t nearly as healthy for you as just plain water.
They complain that people should be drinking their water from the faucet. Well a lot of people do just that and nobody is suggesting otherwise. But when people want to buy a bottle of water don’t they have a right to do that without somebody wagging their finger at them and calling it wrong? If that catches on then next we’ll be told it is wrong to buy any drinks from a store and while you are at it, ban the sale of candy bars and ice cream too!
They are complaining that we are running out of water. I don’t know what part of the country they are talking about but not here in southern Maine. If there is one thing we have an awful lot of here is rainfall and snowfall. We get around four feet of rainwater every year in Maine. That is well over one million gallons of water a year on every acre of land in the whole state. Every drop of it eventually ends up in the ocean whether we use it to drink, bottle or wash our car. Poland Spring offers to pay twice the rate everyone else in the water district pays and we have plenty of water to sell – so what’s wrong with that?
Finally they are complaining that Poland Spring is part of a big company and somehow that is a bad thing too. That is so unfair and unrealistic! In Maine, if you don’t work for a big company you probably depend on your income from those that do! Poland Spring employs more than 800 people in Maine. They pay them a good salary with good benefits and their jobs are in a clean, safe work environment. They are one of the few manufacturing businesses left in Maine and if they can grow the business and hire more people we should be celebrating.
I hope the trustees of the Kennebunk, Kennebunkport and Wells Water District make their decision based on what their experts tell them about the availability of water. If this sale of water is environmentally sustainable then go ahead and do it. That would be good for our community, good for our economy and good for everybody.
Joe Cummings
Arundel
In 1975 I started Cummings Market in West Kennebunk and ran it for more than 20 years, then I sold it and retired in 1996. Running a small convenience store requires you to know and serve the people in the area pretty well. You have to sell stuff people want and keep your costs down so you can keep prices as low as possible.
When I read about the Kennebunk, Kennebunkport and Wells Water District’s plan to sell water to Poland Spring I guess they are just trying to do the same thing. They want to keep providing water to the area but keep their costs down by selling some extra water for Poland Spring to put in a bottle. But I am surprised that so many people are complaining about it and their arguments just don’t make sense.
For example, they complain that people are buying too much bottled water. At my old store we had a cooler that was about 24 feet long and only about two shelves of the whole cooler was for selling bottled water. That was because we sold a whole lot more beer, soda, ice tea and other drinks than we sold bottled water. If you wanted to complain about what people are drinking I would think you would start with all those other drinks that use a lot more water to make in the first place, use bottles too but aren’t nearly as healthy for you as just plain water.
They complain that people should be drinking their water from the faucet. Well a lot of people do just that and nobody is suggesting otherwise. But when people want to buy a bottle of water don’t they have a right to do that without somebody wagging their finger at them and calling it wrong? If that catches on then next we’ll be told it is wrong to buy any drinks from a store and while you are at it, ban the sale of candy bars and ice cream too!
They are complaining that we are running out of water. I don’t know what part of the country they are talking about but not here in southern Maine. If there is one thing we have an awful lot of here is rainfall and snowfall. We get around four feet of rainwater every year in Maine. That is well over one million gallons of water a year on every acre of land in the whole state. Every drop of it eventually ends up in the ocean whether we use it to drink, bottle or wash our car. Poland Spring offers to pay twice the rate everyone else in the water district pays and we have plenty of water to sell – so what’s wrong with that?
Finally they are complaining that Poland Spring is part of a big company and somehow that is a bad thing too. That is so unfair and unrealistic! In Maine, if you don’t work for a big company you probably depend on your income from those that do! Poland Spring employs more than 800 people in Maine. They pay them a good salary with good benefits and their jobs are in a clean, safe work environment. They are one of the few manufacturing businesses left in Maine and if they can grow the business and hire more people we should be celebrating.
I hope the trustees of the Kennebunk, Kennebunkport and Wells Water District make their decision based on what their experts tell them about the availability of water. If this sale of water is environmentally sustainable then go ahead and do it. That would be good for our community, good for our economy and good for everybody.
Joe Cummings
Arundel
Consumer choice is an important aspect to examine in the whole bottled water issue, overall, your argument didn't hold much water (pardon the pun). You ended with, "If this sale of water is environmentally sustainable then go ahead and do it."
The thing is, this sale of water is anything but environmentally sustainable. The people who protested the contract between Kennebunk and Nestle know the incredibly damaging implications of bottling water.
Producing bottled for the U.S. bottled water market required the equivalent of 17 million barrels of oil last year and generated more than 2.5 million tons of carbon dioxide. On top of that, only 20% of the plastic bottles are recycled and the rest end up in landfills.
This is why the concerned citizens of Maine are fighting against Nestle, to protect their water and their environment.
To learn more about the bottled water issue visit:
www.thinkoutsidethebottle.org
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My concern is that we all share one planet and when I am finished using a plastic bottle one time why should that bottle still be here for future generations? We are a disposable society, CLEAN UP PEOPLE and get water from your facet with a reusable bottle! All it takes is preplanning. Don't leave home without a reusable bottle of water and you will save money and the environment. Put simply: I am sick of stepping on your empty water bottles at the beach. If you live in an arid climate...stop watering your lawn and save water for it's most important purpose, sustaining life.
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This article appears to be written by a very uneducated man who feels as though he knows a whole lot about everything. What on earth do candy bars and ice cream have to do with water anyway! Glad to know the size of the freezer at Cummings Market 20 years ago. It's no surprise to the world that you would sell more beer than water in southern Maine. After reading this article a couple of times, I'm not sure that he knows any more than I do about what was rambling about. Maybe he was drinking some of that beer when he wrote it? I can't imagine what else he could possibly have to do after retirement in southern Maine anyway?!? Seems to me that this article is no more than the ramblings of an old man who seems to think that owning a small market has given him great understanding on what's really important to the ecomomy.
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I can understand you making a rebuttal on this article, however, you don't have to be unkind about the writer of it. Learn to make a point without bashing other people. Perhaps you need to cleanse your mind with a nice bottle of water.
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Wow, every sentence from t smiten, it seems, is to only put down the author of the article instead of intelli"gently" dealing with a real opinion about the subject. Very mean.
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I think this was written very well. It makes a lot of sense. Thank you for your article Mr. Cummings. I think you seem very intellegent and not at all an old man rambling like our prior writer so "kindly" mentioned. I agree with you one hundrew percent!!
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Awesome article Mr. Cummings!
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