Evian - History

History

In 1789, during a walk, the Marquis of Lessert drank water from the Sainte Catherine spring on the land of a Mr. Cachat. The marquis, who was allegedly suffering from kidney and liver problems, drank the water regularly while he walked, and claimed that his health improved. Encouraged by Lessert's advocacy of the 'miraculous' water, local doctors began to prescribe it as a health remedy. In response to the growing success of the water, Mr Cachat fenced off his spring and began selling the water. The first baths appeared in 1824. The name of the spring was changed from Sainte Catherine to the Cachat Source. Two years later, the Duke of Savoy gave his permission to start bottling water from the spring and in 1829 the first Société des Eaux Minérales (Mineral Water company) was founded.

In 1859 the business became a public company as the "Société anonyme des eaux minérales de Cachat" and a year later it became French when Savoy was incorporated into France under the Treaty of Turin. The French Ministry of Health reauthorized the bottling of Cachat water on the recommendation of the Medicine academy in 1878. In 1908 Evian water began to be sold in glass bottles manufactured by the glass factory Souchon-Neuvesel which today is a part of Owens-Illinois and first PVC bottle was launched in 1969. The next year the BSN Group, which eventually became the Danone Group, took 100% control of Evian brand. 1978 marked an entrance into the U.S. market. In 1995 Evian switched to collapsible PET bottles.

In 1998, Evian teamed up with Virgin Records and EMI for the mix album Club Nation. The album featured many advertisements for Evian, including a logo on the cover, six full pages in the booklet, and the image of a bottle of Evian on CD1 and a crushed bottle of Evian on CD2.

In 2009, Evian launched the advertisement campaign, "Evian Roller Babies"; this won a Gold Award at the London International Awards 2009 for Best Visual Effects.

At 2012, the Evian slogan is "Live Young".