Nonprofit Athena Bottled Water Adds a Retailer

Seattle area nonprofit Athena Partners recently announced that Quality Food Centers now carries Athena™ bottled water in its 79 Western Washington retail stores.

"We are pleased to have QFC join us as a retailer of Athena water," said Trish May, founder and CEO of Athena Partners. "QFC is a company with a rich heritage in the Northwest and a strong customer following. Their distribution of Athena water will help expand the product’s availability to a new group of shoppers and further our mission of generating funds for northwest cancer research."

Athena Partners is dedicated to advancing research and education to eliminate breast and reproductive cancers. A full 100 percent of the net profits from sales of Athena bottled water is devoted to forward-thinking research to find a cure.

A former Microsoft marketing executive (PowerPoint was her "baby") and breast cancer survivor who also lost her mother to the disease, May decided to wade into the bottled water market last summer. As she sat in her living room contemplating the nonprofit income potential of various health foods, she surrounded herself with hundreds of dollars' worth of energy bars, cereals, tofu, yogurts, nuts, fruits, rice, beans and teas as visual aids.

To quench her thirst during her one-woman focus group, May reportedly kept bottled water within arm's reach. It wasn't long before she realized it was the very product she was seeking to market.

May incorporated Athena Partners in December as a 501C3, and she introduced Athena Bottled Water to consumers in July. It's sold in 500 ml (16.9 fl oz) 24-bottle cases, 500 ml (16.9 fl oz) six-packs, and 1-liter (33.8 fl oz) single serve bottles.

In Western Washington, Athena now is sold at more than 110 Safeway stores, in addition to the 79 QFC stores. It's also the exclusive bottled water at 65 Tully's Coffee locations, and May has more deals in the works.

Source: Athena Parthers