Yellowstone National Park sells Montana Silver Springs water in recyclable aluminum bottles to cut down on plastic

Philipsburg Brewing Co. has ventured into a new packaging market after bottling its Montana Silver Springs mountain fresh spring water into re-sealable aluminium bottles last year. Now they have won a contract to sell this bottled water in Xanterra Parks & Resorts’ Yellowstone National Park.

"We just got a contract with them this year," said Nolan Smith, co-owner of the brewery and Granite Mountain Water Works. "We're distributing in the Greater Yellowstone Area right now and being very well accepted."

A portion of the Park sales goes to the Yellowstone Forever, a non-profit organization raising money to fund various park projects.

Xanterra stopped selling plastic bottled water in its parks since 2016 and Philipsburg’s aluminium bottles fit in with Xanterra's eco-friendly drive in Yellowstone. With the growing awareness against plastic bottles, Xanterra has been cutting down on the use of plastics in its parks.

The idea was suggested by Marta Unclebach, former head of Beverage and Pub Operations for Yellowstone National Park Lodges/Xanterra. Dylan Hoffman, Xanterra's director of sustainability, said the company has been able to eliminate about 250,000 plastic bottles from Yellowstone each year.

Hoffman added that the shift to aluminium is because the recycling rate of aluminium is much, much higher and widely accepted because of its easy remelting process.

Founded in 2012, the Philipsburg brewery was established downtown in the Sayrs bank building. By 2014, they bought an old mountain spring water bottling plant, which was lying idle since 2004, for business expansion. They have been selling spring water in plastic and aluminium bottles. 

Hoffman said that initially sales of the aluminium bottled water in the park were slow until the labels were redesigned so buyers understood it was water.

"Now it has a Yellowstone National Park brand" making the bottles "almost commemorative quality," he concluded.