Mountain Valley Spring Company is one of the oldest large format water delivery companies out there. It may soon be a public company as well if the initial public offering filing goes through. The filing noted that it will list under the stock ticker symbol of “WATR” if approved.
Rodman & Renshaw, LLC is the only listed underwriter from the filing. No financial terms were disclosed but it did note that it would sell up to $23 million in common stock and that shares would be sold by the company and by selling shareholders.
The company markets itself as “America’s Premium Water” and it has operations listed on its tombstone back into the 1800s. mountain Valley’s bottled water division operates under the name “Mountain Valley Spring Water” and its PET bottle division operates under the name “Veriplas.”
In fiscal 2010, Mountain Valley’s bottled water division accounted for approximately 60% of net sales and its manufacturing preformed bottles and finished bottles from polyethylene terephthalate resins accounted for the remaining 40%. The company noted, “As we continue to grow as a company, we anticipate that net sales for our bottled water division will far exceed that of our PET division.”
The predecessor of its bottled water division, Mountain Valley Spring Water of Hot Springs, Arkansas, was established in 1871, making this America’s oldest continuously operated bottled water company.
As far as its protection of the water supply, it noted, “The source of water for our products is natural spring water collected from three natural springs located approximately 10 miles from Hot Springs, Arkansas. In order to protect the watershed of the springs, we own forest land surrounding each of the springs, which in the aggregate totals over 2,000 acres, and no activities are conducted on this property other than bottling operations and selective timber harvesting in order to preserve the health of the forest.”
Sales in 2009 were $22.24 million and that figure rose to $24.21 million in 2010. Sales in the first 9-months of 2011 rose to $19.95 million from $18.81 million for the same period a year earlier.
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