Posted on 03/03/2017 1:04:40 PM PST by nickcarraway
Anyone who has spent time in the Swiss Alps knows how clean and fresh the air feels. Now one British expat is attempting to capitalize on this natural Swiss asset by bottling and selling ‘genuine mountain air’ – for a genuine Swiss price.
Basel resident John Green’s fledgling online business, mountainairfromswitzerland.com, sells his Swiss air in branded bottles costing from $97 for 500ml, $167 for one litre and $247 for three litres, worldwide shipping included.
The initiative is partly for charity, with Green pledging 25 percent of profits to World Vision in support of a clean water programme in Africa.
The bottles come with a signed certificate of authenticity and the GPS coordinates of exactly where the air was collected.
Billed as “the ultimate present for the man or woman that has everything,” the website says it’s collected from secret locations in Switzerland and is “surely the best air in the world”.
“As you open your ice cold jar of air (it's recommended to chill in the freezer for full effect) you flick the latch open and there's a quick pfsst as the mountain pressure equalises and you can take a breath of genuine mountain air from Switzerland,” it says.
Green's 'Swiss air' comes with an authenticity certificate. Photo: mountainairfromswitzerland.com
Speaking to The Local on Monday, Green, originally from Kent in England, said: “We really do go to a secret location near Zermatt and bottle the air and bring it back, label it up and send it off.
“I know it’s a bit crazy but it’s a fun idea and it helps give some money to a charity that I think is deserving.”
Green acknowledges that his prices are steep for what is literally thin air, but says it’s a necessary price tag, and that he may increase the percentage given to World Vision if all goes well.
“There are expenses, we’ve got to send the stuff out worldwide. I want to try and make it sustainable, I don’t want it to be a five minute wonder and make a huge loss. If you try and charge the minimum price you won’t be sustainable and you’ll go out of business.”
“And also don’t forget, it’s Swiss air! Everything in Switzerland is expensive.”
Having lived in Basel for 20 years, Green, who also runs a wellness advice website, thinks there’s definitely something about being in the Swiss outdoors that makes you feel good – though he can’t definitively say it’s the air.
“On the weekends I quite often go the mountains and come back like a different person. I don’t really know what it is, whether it’s the skiing or the air, but there’s something, definitely, that makes you feel good.”
But it remains to be seen if anyone will actually deem his bottled Swiss air worth buying. Has he had any takers so far?
“It’s starting slowly, let’s put it like that!”
Great air, (and Water), up here....maybe I should go into biz!!
Well, it’s better than a Spencer’s bottled fart.
Does he offer refunds if I am not intoxicated from joy? 8>)
I remember reading an account of a traveler who visited the remote island of St. Kilda far to the West of Scotland. I think this was around 500 years ago.
Although remote, the island had been occupied for a thousand years. The visitor later wrote that the water on the island was so pleasant the he could not stand to drink water elsewhere for a couple of weeks.
I guess bottled water is better at least from some locations. Now bottled air might be too but who would pay for such a tiny amount?
I am selling fresh Nigerian air! Send me only $167 per litre and routing information!! I will send you refund of $25,000,000 to your account immediately.
Planet Spaceball will get the combination from King Olaf.
Between the cold and the low mountain air pressure, that pfsst you hear is your nasty valley air entering the container and polluting the clean mountain air.
Green says the air comes from a secret location, but the bottles have the GPS coordinates of where it was collected.
How’s that again?
For 10 times the amount of a 3 liter bottle of air I could go and inhale thousands of liters. The air down here in Louisiana will do just fine though.
P. T. Barnum comes to mind!
It smells like marketing BS.
I was just joking. No way is this gonna fly.
500 Years ago people rarely drank water. Unless it was boiled first. They mostly stuck with wine and beer/ale.
But I imagine getting it direct from the source must have been nectar.
Yeah I knew you were. I just can’t believe this guy is serious. Perhaps he has a bunch of 3 liter bottles around that he doesn’t know what to do with them. I guess though it really requires no overhead. He doesn’t need to bottle it before an order rolls in. And that bottling process would take seconds I would imagine. 8>)
I have some good Rocky Mountain air if anyone is interested.
60 years ago, the joke was obvious. Are democrats that much more gullible? (The answer is sorta glaring, isn't it?)
This man is a genius. The people who buy the stuff, not so much.
Oh noes! This could upset fragile eco-systems globally.
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