Our Company's History
Nicolet Forest Bottling Company Inc. bubbled up from an unlikely Wisconsin natural resource. In 1982 Dave Holdener needed brook trout to restock a pond on his family's Wisconsin property. The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources referred him to a nearby trout farmer. A year later Dave returned for more fry for his pond and learned the trout producer was thinking the artesian well water that fed his hatchery would be good for people, too. The farmer was considering bottling water in gallon jugs and selling it. Dave asked the farmer, "Come on, who's gonna buy water?"
The annual treks for young trout continued along with the farmer's passionate contemplations. In 1985 Dave found the creative fish farmer true to his word-he was selling his artesian water in gallon jugs locally. Dave was consulting in the consumer packaged-goods industry and asked several clients what they thought of bottled water's future. By the end of 1985 Dave was distributing the trout farmer's artesian water in 5-gallon bottles to homes and offices in the Chicago area.
As interest and consumers' demand for natural bottled water continued growing, Dave wanted to find a source with long-term, consistent quality, and far from the possible impact of agricultural or industrial contaminates. He learned of a family in Mountain, Wis., who was struggling with a small bottling operation it had begun for the natural artesian water on its homestead property in the Nicolet National Forest.
Dave and several investors purchased the fledgling business and small farm-homestead property that maintained its private ownership when the national forest was created in 1933. In January 1988, Nicolet Forest Bottling Company produced its first 5-gallon bottle of Nicolet Natural Artesian Water.
Under the forest canopy near Nicolet Forest Bottling Company's plant, taken by Nicolet team member Dorine Capaletti.
Nicolet Forest Bottling Company constructed a state-of-the-art water bottling plant in 1989 for five-gallon bottles for home and office water delivery. Due to explosive demand for bottled water, the company underwent two significant plant expansions, one in 1993 to enter the retail market with Nicolet Natural in single-serve bottles, and again in 1998 for additional capacity and warehouse space.
Operations continue growing under Dave's leadership as founder and president. Today Nicolet Natural is distributed to homes and offices in six Midwestern states and available at select retail stores in four states.
As it turned out, that trout farmer wasn't all wet after all.
