Consumer Beware! Three criteria will help you identify fake water ionizer review sites.
A couple of months ago, I was pretty much in your shoes, looking for a "thorough and unbiased review" of water ionizers on the market. You see, a good friend of mine had told me about this amazing technology from Japan called Kangen Water that had totally changed his life. I was curious but money was tight and I was not willing to part ways with my hard earned money. Even though I trusted him from a long history of business engagements in the past. I was going to look around. I knew that my friend would be making a commission when he sold me a machine, so I thought I would let him earn his keep if the product he was selling was as good as he said it was. So in doing my due diligence online, I searched Google for "Kangen Water Reviews" and "Kangen Water Scam" and found a couple of decent looking sites on the first page. A couple of water ionizer review sites also had sponsored links on Google.
Let me share with you my experience and the three criteria that I found in several of these sites that feature bogus water ionizer reviews.
These sites were right away bashing Kangen Water with wrong facts and figures. Next, they were comparing apples versus oranges by comparing different price points and capacities. Finally, they were made by people who make money if you followed their advice and click on the links to their own websites.
So can these "independent" water ionizer review sites be "unbiased and thorough?" Not!
How To Do Due Diligence When You Cannot Trust Online Sources?
Well, you go offline. I did my due diligence the old and tested way. I talked to real people on the phone and visited with real people at their homes, at presentations, and at the company premises. Literally, I "kicked a few tires, looked under the hood, and test drove." You see, buying a water ionizer is very much like buying a car. You can read as much literature and watch as many videos about a car online but your buying confidence level would not be as high until you do your research offline by visiting a car dealer and getting into the car and test driving it. Here is the analogy when buying a car then later I'll take you step by step in choosing the water ionizer that is right for you.
In buying a car, first you determine the kind of car based on your need. Is it for personal or commercial use? Do you want to keep it short term or long term? How much load you will carry and how fast you want to get there will determine the horsepower, and the number of cylinders and displacement of the engine. Then you have to consider warranty, service and maintenance. Finally, you look into affordability with financing options. You become familiar with a car that you want by doing your due diligence. Let us say your best candidate is a Mercedes that is priced at ,000, When someone else approaches you with another car that looks like, sounds like, runs like, and handles like the Mercedes you want - at HALF the PRICE, your first thought is "What is wrong with it?"
You just don't jump into the deal - without finding out more! That other car is cheaper because it is cheap. Something has to give! You get what you pay for. When you evaluate the water ionizer that is right for you, first you determine the kind of ionizer based on your need. Is it for personal or commercial use? Do you want to keep it short term or long term? How many wellness issues do you have to resolve and how fast do you want to get there will determine the electrical power (wattage), the number of plates and surface area and throughput rate. Then you have to consider warranty, service and maintenance which all depend on the manufacturing quality of the water ionizer device. Finally, you look into price and financing.
Common Pitfalls for Water Ionizer Deals
In the water ionizer buying process, a lot of innocent consumers fall for the "Half The Price and Just as Good" deals because they do not educate themselves. Later they find out that their hard earned money was just whisked away out of the box or a just weeks or a couple of months after using their bogus water ionizers. On the other side of the spectrum, uneducated consumers also fall for the over-rated knock-offs - those that are marketed with the "beefy" power supply of a gazillion watts and a gazillion electrode plates.
Optimum Kangen Water Machine Configuration
Research has shown that having an electrolytic chamber bearing more than 7 platinum coated titanium solid plates of about 7 inches by 5 inches in dimension and powered by a solid power transformer with more than 230 watts do not improve the quality of ionized water. Beyond that, the limiting factor is the quality of the water itself. To produce 2.5 pH strong acidic water and 11.5 pH strong Kangen water, Enagic engineers designed the introduction of an electrolytic enhancer into the water stream. There is strong criticism against having sodium hypochlorite (a bleach reagent) and the sodium chloride (common table salt) solution in the electrolyte enhancer.
However, the review sites intentionally and conveniently omit mention of the rinse down cycle and you do not drink strong acidic water and strong Kangen water. The rinse cycle cleans up the electrolytic chamber before you get into the drinking water operation again. Regarding the alleged environmental and dietary harm, the common U.S. household more likely puts out more bleach from their laundry and takes in more salt from their Standard American Diet (S.A.D.)
How Test Results Can Be Skewed To Make an Inferior Water Ionizer Brand Look Better
The most disturbing and misleading comparison that bogus water ionizer review sites show is the Oxidation Reduction Potential (ORP) measurements. ORP of the water being tested depends on 1) the flow rate, 2) on the content of the electrolytic chamber immediately prior to the test and most importantly, 3) the scale buildup in the electrolytic chamber.
You can hardly detect the same flow rates on their video by the relative size of the water stream. Note that a more open faucet valve increases actual throughput without increasing the size of the stream. The stream size is usually constricted by the aperture of the pipe. When a 9.5 pH alkaline water from an Enagic Leveluk SD501 is showing an ORP measurement in the -100 to -200 milliVolt range (like the other competitor measurements), there are only 3 reasons. First, the valve position is more open. Second, there was acid water in the chamber right before the test. Third, there is considerable scale build up in the electrolytic chamber.
The Common Enemy of All Water Ionizers
The bogus review sites do not mention that scale build up over time will gradually decrease ORP in the water coming out from ALL water ionizers including Enagic machines. In fact, severe scale buildup will make any water ionizer useless. While scaled up water ionizers may not or may still generate alkaline ionized water, the ORP will be at or just slightly below the ORP of the incoming water stream. The ORP will be in the positive range which means oxidizing instead of antioxidizing,
This is the point when you will not get any benefit from drinking ionized water because the water ionizer electrolysis plates are fouled up with extreme scale build up. This is exactly the reason why over time, the excitement over ionized water wanes - not because the placebo effect goes away - but because the active properties are measurably gone! Enagic Leveluk SD510 owners who never service their water ionizers also sadly get this experience and later mistakenly think they overspent money. You should see actual ionizer plates with extreme scale buildup caused by high water hardness, poor scale prevention design, and poor ionizer maintenance. I have pictures of plugged up ionizer plates posted on my website. When you see these pictures, you would not want to be drinking the water that flows through these plates!
How Much Does It Cost To Replace Throw Away Water Ionizers in Comparison To One That Lasts 15 Years
Although they mention about the automatic means of cleaning to prevent scale buildup, the bogus sites that give fake kangen water reviews conveniently omit very important service factors. If you want a throw away type of water ionizer, you can disregard these two facts about Enagic.
Enagic provides a cleaning powder unit (CPU) and food grade citric acid powder conveniently packed in single use sachets. This will allow you to manually do citric acid cleaning on a regular basis in the convenience of your home. An instructional video that shows the simple citric acid cleaning process is posted on my website. This acid cleaning process also applies to Enagic's clone killer, the SunUS that is priced at only ,280. Enagic is also the only company in the industry to offer a fee-based annual routine deep scale cleaning. This service is available at its service centers around the world. Loaners are available and you do have to arrange that ahead of time.
When you become an Enagic Leveluk SD501 owner and regularly descale your machine using the in-home citric acid cleaning process and the annual deep scale cleaning, you can look forward to consistent Oxidation Reduction Potential (ORP) measurements up to -800 milliVolts and a 15 to 20 year water ionizer lifespan.
A Little Device That You Should Have If You Drink Ionized Alkaline Water
For a measly 0, you can buy a simple Oxidation Reduction Potential (ORP) meter and literally test the waters for yourself. Unfortunately, the ORP meter probes do not last long. You have to replace them every 18 months. So do not fall for water ionizers that have built in ORP meters for the reason that the lifespan of the ORP probe could limit the lifespan of your water ionizer. You won't even know you were taken by frivolous claims if you do not measure the properties of the ionized water that these knock off water ionizer brands produce. Do measure ORP over time because ORP dissipates. Take measurements - in several intervals of hours - after you collect the water up for up to 24 to 48 hours after. Do not be taken, if these Kangen Water reviews, tell you that you do not need better than -400 milliVolts of ORP. The better ORP gives you that allowance for the ORP to dissipate while you store your water in a container for later consumption. You will be surprised to find out how invariably unstable the ORP of the water will be from different candidate water ionizer brands.
Take It For A Test Drive
If you are not convinced of any of the benefits of alkaline ionized water, regardless of the brand, do test drive. Try their alkaline water out. Ask for fresh alkaline water samples over 21 days from your candidate source. Do not fall for the excuse that all alkaline ionized water is the same. They are not. That is why there are different price points. Do you think all gasoline is the same? Of course not. Also make sure that the alkaline water you are sampling comes from the equivalent unit that you intend to buy. If you are sampling from the .980 Enagic Leveluk SD510, do not expect the same results when you buy and bring home the ,280 Enagic SunUS.
When you are sampling Kangen water, make sure you are replenishing better than every two or three days. The fresher, the better. If you are replenishing only once a week or every other week, stop wasting your time and don't give your Kangen distributor false hopes of you buying a Kangen water machine when you get results. You will not likely get the results you are hoping for because the ORP will have dissipated after the second or third day. I cover sampling instructions in more detail in one of my websites dedicated just for that purpose.
High Quality Makes Safety A Number One Priority
Most water ionizer reviews do not also get into the safety issue. Like cars, prices vary depending on their crash safety rating. In water ionizers, the quality of the material and the manufacturing process of the electrolysis plates are major safety considerations. So far, Enagic is the only manufacturer that claims it is ISO 9001, ISO 14001 and ISO 13485 certified. ISO 13485 is proof of adherence to a comprehensive management system for the design and manufacture of medical devices.
Platinum is more inert than titanium but it is too expensive to be exclusively used to make the solid electrolysis plates. Forget mesh plates. Mesh plates get plugged up with scale build up too fast to worry about platinum coating wear out. Platinum plating of solid titanium plates is the industry standard not only because of the inertness of platinum but also small traces of platinum are considered beneficial to human health. When the titanium core is exposed because the low quality platinum coating flakes off or because the design is flawed, titanium poisoning may result to the person drinking from a poor quality water ionizer.
Compare Apples Versus Apples
Also make sure the kangen water reviews are comparing water ionizers that are the same caliber - the same price points, the same number of plates, and the same surface area of plates. For example, they should compare a three plate ionizer with other three plate ionizers. Compare ionizers with five plate. Compare ionizers with seven plates. Do not get tricked by water ionizer reviews that mix and match different calibers of water ionizers. You know that a 6 cylinder car will perform better than a 4 cylinder car so you can expect that their price points will be different. So why would you fall for a water ionizer review site that compares a 5 plate ionizer with a 7 plate ionizer or compares a ,000 ionizer with a ,000 unit? Enagic does have water ionizers priced from ,280 that will out last any water ionizer you can buy on the internet - so do not let low price fool you. You will always get what you pay for.
Now You See Them, Now You Don't
New water ionizer internet retailers are scary sources to buy from regardless of price point. These new businesses generally have shorter expected lifespan than the more proven and established companies like the solid 37 year old Enagic. Water ionizer internet retailers can also easily hide behind the internet veil of anonymity, voicemail, and email when customer service issues arise. When you buy from a direct seller, you can get back to them personally on a first name basis much easier for whatever purpose you need to call them. The main company of the direct selling agent is also available if the agent cannot service directly.
So What If It Is MLM?
The most misleading comparison is how water ionizers are sold. The criticism on Enagic is the "MLM" model of 8 layers of mark ups that supposedly increases the price. From a buyer's perspective, what matters is the price point that gives you the features you want. It does not matter how many times the mark up is split up. The more people on the payroll involved in serving the customer, the better the customer experience will be. There will always be a mark up as part of the total price and it will always be split up regardless of who you buy it from.
Water ionizers are typically marked up 60 to 70% of the price so a water ionizer company can remain viably in business. The companies that decide not to keep this mark up and reduce the price usually just become bankrupt and go out of business sooner. What that means to you is that if your water ionizer retailer goes out of business sooner, you will not be able to get warranty service or replacement filter supplies anymore.
Not All MLMs Are The Same
Some water ionizer reviews also make it appear that the MLM business model is like that of the 80's when a lot of people lost their money in illegal schemes. They don't tell you that Enagic is a member of the prestigious Direct Selling Association (DSA). The DSA is the national trade association of the leading firms that manufacture and distribute goods and services sold directly to consumers continuously monitored under a strict code of ethics. Approximately 200 companies are members of the association, including many well-known brand names, while there are tens of thousands of network marketing companies that fail to qualify into DSA membership.
If you still think all MLM companies are illegal, you need to know that people like Warren Buffet and Donald Trump own and endorse the network marketing business model. MLM has come a long way. People are scammed into MLM because they think they can earn money by just joining the business or buying the product. MLM companies come and go just like any other business. You have to get training and work it to make any money. That means you have to get leads and sales outside your own friends and family.
Final Thoughts
So if you are considering the "Half the Price and Just as Good" Deal or the "Beefy and Over-rated" Deal, do think again. You do have two choices. 1) Buy a throw away water ionizer that you have to replace every so often depending on the hardness of your source water; or 2) Buy a high quality serviceable water ionizer that will last you 15 to 20 years of service when properly maintained.
