The Eaubottle Project
In 2018 childhood friends Tomas and Björn launched their idea on Kickstarter: Drill water wells in Africa through selling premium vacuum bottles. The minimalistic Scandinavian design by Henrik Johansson outperforms all tested competitors on the market in keeping drinks hot and cold.
Björn has a background from 11 years on the board of the United Nations Fund in Sweden and knew that donors to charities in general are worried that their money may not reach its target. Being able to trace the money and showing that it makes a difference on the other side of the planet is tricky. Having many friends among the charitable community, Eaubottle managed to find local charities and operators that could ensure that we can trace the money from every bottle to exactly a GPS location for the water well it financed. We interview the villagers and put their stories on the carton box. Each water well has its own box, so if you collect several Eaubottle from different wells you will get several stories on the boxes.
Eaubottle always drills the water well first so that you can be certain your money reaches its target. To finance both the water well and all the 5.000 bottles that will be sold, Björn and Tomas put in all the cash they had and managed to borrow money in as small local bank when all the big banks said no. But they had to guarantee the loan with their own houses. The first years were scary as the loan was huge. Tomas and Björn have decided not to take salaries or profits from the company and still handle all work for Eaubottle on evenings and weekends while making their living on “real” jobs.
As the bottles for the first well in Bulingin sold out Tomas and Björn decided to borrow more money and drill two more wells in Kogri and Sampina, Ghana. This time Swedish celebrity Carolina Gynning joined on the trip. Her bottles sold out rapidly and now one of her paintings is featured as an annual collectible bottle. By late 2021 Eaubottle has managed to drill seven (7) water wells providing water to 10.686 villagers. We always drill next to the village CHPS primary care unit. Lack of water at childbirth is a huge problem and providing water wells has proven to cut mortality rates. Water literally saves lives.
We are also cleaning the oceans as the cap on each bottle is made up of 65% recycled ocean plastic, thus removing drifting fishing nets etc. from the seas. And of course, the most sustainable reason of all: A stainless steel bottle lasts a lifetime and is much better than single use plastic bottles even if you recycle them. In a full life cycle analysis, it has been shown that 50 uses of your Eaubottle makes it more sustainable than single use options, even if they are recycled and even if you calculate energy and environment impact of making the stainless steel. In normal use, that means that already after a few months you are helping make the planet more sustainable. And your bottle will last for many, many years. We guarantee it!
And you are giving water to a fellow human for 7 years in Ghana. Not bad!
Please help share our cause… Perhaps you know a company that could use Eaubottle as giveaways? Perhaps you are involved in a sports club or school that wants to earn money selling our bottles?
There are millions of water bottles sold every year. Imagine if a large share were Eaubottle…. That would give water to so many people and save so many lives.
Let’s drill a well!
