Chinese buy up bottles of fresh air from Canada
Canadian company which started out as a joke bottling Rocky Mountains air has seen its product fly off the shelves in pollution-hit China, with first shipment selling out in four days
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Chinese buy up bottles of fresh air from Canada - Telegraph A Chinese woman wears a mask connected to a filter in Beijing Photo: Kevin Frayer/Getty Images
By Jennifer Pak, Shenzhen
1:17PM GMT 15 Dec 2015
A Canadian start-up company bottling fresh air from the Rocky Mountains has seen sales to China soar because of rising pollution levels.
Vitality Air was founded last year in the western Canadian city of Edmonton but began selling in China less than two months ago.
“Our first shipment of 500 bottles of fresh air were sold in four days,” co-founder Moses Lam says in a telephone interview with the Telegraph.
A crate containing 4,000 more bottles is making its way to China, but he says most of that shipment has been bought.
Banff National Park in Alberta, Canada Photo: Alamy
A 7.7 Litre can of crisp air taken from Banff National Park in the majestic Rocky Mountains range sells for roughly 100 yuan (£10), which is 50 times more expensive than a bottle of mineral water in China.
• Choking smog more than 50 times health guidelines blankets China
Most of their customers live in big cities in the northeastern and southern parts of China where severe pollution warnings have become a common occurence.
State news agency Xinhua has posted a picture online of the city centre barely visible under a thick soup of smog on Tuesday and reflects local frustrations with the caption: “Heavy smog hit China, again!”
Canadian company which started out as a joke bottling Rocky Mountains air has seen its product fly off the shelves in pollution-hit China, with first shipment selling out in four days
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By Jennifer Pak, Shenzhen
1:17PM GMT 15 Dec 2015
A Canadian start-up company bottling fresh air from the Rocky Mountains has seen sales to China soar because of rising pollution levels.
Vitality Air was founded last year in the western Canadian city of Edmonton but began selling in China less than two months ago.
“Our first shipment of 500 bottles of fresh air were sold in four days,” co-founder Moses Lam says in a telephone interview with the Telegraph.
A crate containing 4,000 more bottles is making its way to China, but he says most of that shipment has been bought.
A 7.7 Litre can of crisp air taken from Banff National Park in the majestic Rocky Mountains range sells for roughly 100 yuan (£10), which is 50 times more expensive than a bottle of mineral water in China.
• Choking smog more than 50 times health guidelines blankets China
Most of their customers live in big cities in the northeastern and southern parts of China where severe pollution warnings have become a common occurence.
State news agency Xinhua has posted a picture online of the city centre barely visible under a thick soup of smog on Tuesday and reflects local frustrations with the caption: “Heavy smog hit China, again!”
