October 13, 2026 – Have you noticed the roller coaster of grocery prices lately? Just when consumers think prices might be coming down, up they go again!
At AquaNew, we made a modest price increase of approximately 10% for Watt-Ahh bottled water during the Summer of 2023, over two years ago. Unfortunately, the extra revenue from the sales of Watt-Ahh did not completely cover the relentless climb in packaging, shipping and distribution costs that so many businesses have experienced.
Before going any further, we want to reassure our customers: We are NOT announcing another Watt-Ahh price increase at this time!
Instead, we want to share the fascinating ups-and-downs—and now ups-again—pricing story of one of America’s largest food and beverage companies, PepsiCo. It illustrates how even corporate giants face many of the same financial challenges confronting small businesses in today’s grocery marketplace.
Seven Dollars for a Bag of Chips?
Have you noticed that a bag of Doritos or other popular snack chips can cost around $7 these days? That’s quite a price tag for a family snack!
Over the past year, PepsiCo attempted to win back price-conscious shoppers by lowering prices on certain products. However, even with those reductions, many consumers remained reluctant to pay premium prices for their favorite snacks.
According to an October 8, 2026, New York Post article and other media sources, PepsiCo is now reversing some of those price reductions and raising prices on select snacks and beverage products.
According to this article, customers either select a less-expensive snack for their families or substitute with more real-food alternatives (as well as healthier beverages).
The Cost Squeeze: Big Companies and Small Businesses
Like AquaNew, PepsiCo must contend with rising operating expenses, including packaging materials, ingredients, transportation, and distribution logistics. These costs can quickly erode profit margins, regardless of a company’s size.
PepsiCo has concluded that the slightly lower prices did not have a meaningful return of shoppers and now the company has reverted back to pricing hikes on select products to protect its revenue targets.
The Watt-Ahh Pricing Difference Policy
At AquaNew, we face many of these same cost pressures, although on a much smaller sales volume scale.
However, there is an important distinction: Watt-Ahh is truly one-of-a-kind produced by our proprietary technology. Watt-Ahh has no other competition from any similar product in the market.
We feel the responsibility, however, towards our loyal customers to avoid the pricing roller coaster. We recognize that families are already facing enough financial pressures at the grocery store. Our goal is to keep Watt-Ahh pricing as stable as we can while maintaining the quality and special characteristics that our customers have come to appreciate.
Additional Financial Post article on price hikes can be found at this link.