You Spent What?

I remember when bottled water first started being sold? I could not, for the life of me, figure out why people would pay good money for water in a bottle. The love-affair with bottled water shows no signs of slowing down despite the environmental issues. In fact, bottled water is now like wine: different grades with different prices. Bling H2O sells for $40+. People, we're talking WATER here. And that's not even the most expensive water. That title goes to Kona Nigari at about $16.75 an ounce. The bottled water market is expected to hit almost $90 million by next year.

If you need more pep than water will produce, you can always jump on the energy drinks bandwagon. Each time I'd drop Malcolm at school and watch the kids walking by with tins of Red Bull I wonder whether their parents know what they were putting into their bodies. Where are they were getting the money? Since 2002, energy drink sales rose from $1.2 billion and are expected to hit almost $9 billion by next year. Red Bull is at the front of the pack, followed by Moster and Rockstar. Sobe has 4 drinks in the top 15 energy drink brads. Wowza!

Can't stomach that much caffeine all at once? Maybe you'd rather sip yours hot. The U.S. coffee sales market is an $18 billion a year biz, and the average coffee drinker downs just over three cups a day. It's been projected that there will be $50,000 + coffee shops in North America by the end of this year. Americans alone consume 400 million cups of coffee per day making the U.S. the leading consumer of coffee in the world.

Drinking water is one of the best ways to lose weight, so say the experts. And if you're flagging because you haven't eaten enough to keep a butterfly alive, you can always grab a cuppa coffee or a Red Bull, I suppose. The thing about diets that make me scratch my head is that with all the plans out there that work wonders, why do we still have any fat people left? From Atkins to South Beach, there's a diet for everyone. Some plans will even deliver the food you should eat directly to you no matter where you are. The industry is so huge – programs, books, videos, foods and beverages, supplements and pills – that nobody actually knows how big it is. But Nestle Nutrition, which manages Jenny Craig, posted sales of over $9 billion in 2009. Nestle bought Jenny Craig for $600 million in 2006, so I think they've made their money back. Hey, that's just Jenny Craig.

Right along with all the money people spend to not be fat anymore — when really, if you just stopped spending money, that'd work too — [yeah, yeah, I'm fat, but I don't diet!] , comes all the money people will spend on exercise equipment that then become clothes horses and dust catchers. Sure, the exercise equipment company guarantees your success for they'll give you your money back. You'll just have to disassemble the sucker and pay for shipping 800 lbs of deadweight. Hmmm. Exercise equipment sales is a $4.22 billion biz in the U.S.

We also dropped more than $12 billion on exercise shoes in 2008. As if what some people will pay for their own shoes isn't enough to take your breath away, what we'll pay to keep our pooches shod should. When I was shooting one of my Princess who had spent way too much for a dog she couldn't afford, we shot in a doggie boutique. I was gobsmacked at the price of doggie coats and booties. I get that a pet can be like a child. But dontcha know that most come with their own fur coats? So why do we pay to have someone trim off their fuzzy and then pay someone else to make them a new one? In 2010, American households spent over $49 billion on pet-related expenses.

I don't suppose any of the people who are using any of these products have any debt. Nope, I don't suppose they do.