The New Flat Tax
Yes, it’s true. L.A. restaurants are now charging for tap water. By playing on customers’ healthy-living fixations of the moment—parts-per-billion H20 hysteria and globalwarming-consciousness—owners are convincing diners to pony up previously unheard-of fees for each bottle to offset the cost of running their recently acquired Natura filtration machines. Since last fall, fresh carriers of the Brita-like system include Comme Ça (charging $5 per bottle), Il Grano ($6), Luckyfish ($3), Akasha ($5) and Foxtail ($3). The bottles themselves have been shrewdly sculpted as Voss-like status symbols “I wanted to set the tone high,” says Natura cofounder, Marco De Plano. A number of the restaurants say they’ve chosen to attach a price primarily in order to recoup on Natura’s monthly rental cost, which can peak at up to $500. “People may give you a weird look when you bring it out,” says Angeli Caffé manager Jason Marx, “but when you tell them about how it reduces our carbon footprint, they really get behind it.” In fact, local foodies tallying their bills at places like Lucques and Ortolan have already grown accustomed to chipping in donations each March for the L.A. Tap Project, which supports UNICEFs efforts to provide access to potable water around the world. Still, it’s crystalclear that only a few nights’ worth of water tabs could easily cover the relatively modest Natura fee. The rest? Purified profit. Talk about liquid assets.
-Carrissa Marsh
Angeleno
