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Legacy Ventures: Disruption In A Box

Nov. 18, 2015 2:09 PM ETLGYV3 Comments
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Once in a while someone has a simple, easy to implement and potentially frame breaking idea. An idea good enough that people "just get it".

Boxed Water. Water in a milk carton. Enough with the ubiquitous plastic water bottles which clog our landfills and resist recycling. People who want fresh, clean, pure water now have a real alternative. Water in an easily disposed of, biodegradable, box.

For Legacy Ventures International (OTCPK:LGYV), Boxed Water fulfils a strategic niche. Legacy is a Nevada based multinational conglomerate focused on acquisitions of proven and high-potential businesses. Its corporate objectives turn on one key idea: "We love disruption."

What that cashes out to in business terms is that Legacy is "We seek out high-potential companies with big ideas who can scale for hyper growth. We like to deal with category game changers". Boxed Water is precisely that sort of game changer.

The water market in just the United States is huge: 11 billion gallons a year. At wholesale revenues from bottled water in the US in 2013 approached 12.3 billion dollars and the market is growing at roughly 4% per year. The bottled market in Canada is proportionately similar with estimated sales of a billion plus dollars a year.

Multiple factors contribute to bottled water's indisputable attractiveness to Canadian and U.S. consumers. Among them are bottled water's associations with healthfulness, convenience, safety, and value. But, the problem with bottled water is the bottle.

The US consumes billions of bottles of water per year. Virtually all of these bottles are made of plastic. However, only 27% of those bottles are recycled: the rest end up in landfills. Canadians drink at least one billion bottles of water a year. In Canada the recycling rate is significantly higher than in the US but far too many water bottles still end up in landfills.

As consumers become more ecologically aware the plastic water bottle has come to symbolize the culture of waste many consumers want to walk away from. On college campuses and in schools bottled water sales are being banned or sharply curtailed in response to the perception that while the water is great the bottle is a threat to the environment.

There is no question that alternatives to water in plastic bottles can capture a significant share of the market, rather the question is how.

Legacy Ventures acquired Toronto based RM Fresh Brands a few months ago. RM Fresh distributes Boxed Water in Canada and that distribution deal is now Legacy's. Now the challenge was to push Boxed Water into the marketplace and to do that it had to have what might be called "concept awareness". What has been clever about the Boxed Water positioning efforts is that the boxes of water are their own brand identity.

They could not be plainer. Standard one quart, tent top, box in white. On all four sides, in big black letters, this simple statement, "Boxed Water is Better". That's it. The packaging explains the concept. See it once and you get the point.

Of course, the challenge is to have those millions of bottled water drinkers actually see "Boxed Water" so they can actually get the point.

While Legacy could spend money, a lot of money, on advertising following "Boxed Water's" lead and opting for a more viral, celebrity and event driven marketing strategy makes sense in the Canadian market. Putting "Boxed Water" in the hands of people who, themselves, are the focus of media attention lets the box explain itself.

A picture of Anne Hathaway holding up "Boxed Water" in London's Daily Mail newspaper or a shot of Hilary Duff off duty with a box of water under her arm are one side of the marketing strategy.

In the Canadian market a similar strategy can be employed. Legacy has already begun to showcase the product at events like the Toronto Film Festival or Holt Renfrew's Christmas kick off: getting "Boxed Water" into the hands of influencers - celebrity or otherwise - pushes the product. (It is not difficult to imagine "Boxed Water" behind the Maple Leafs bench or in the Bluejays dugout.)

For Legacy, Boxed Water is an opportunity to disrupt the bottled water industry in Canada with an eco friendly, easy to ship, simple solution. It is the first step in a long term strategic plan to identify, market and distribute disruptive brands in growing markets.

Legacy is listed on the OTCQB as LGYV and it has applied for listing on the Canadian Securities Exchange.

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