How to start a water purification plant with home delivery: what nobody tells you about daily operations

To start a water purification plant with home delivery, you need to understand that you are setting up two businesses: a plant that produces the water and a delivery operation that sells it and collects payment on the street. Equipment is a one-time purchase; what decides whether you make money is the daily operation: how many garrafones each route sells (a garrafón is the 20-liter returnable water jug used across Mexico), how much is left on credit and how many jugs come back.

This article does not cover filters or equipment brands. It covers what happens after opening day.

Two businesses in one: the plant and delivery

The plant is the part everyone pictures: taking in water, purifying it, washing garrafones, filling, capping and sealing them. Its costs are fairly stable: water, electricity, equipment consumables, caps, seals, labels and the person running it.

Delivery is a different company. It has trucks, drivers, gasoline, routes, cash on the street, customers who pay later and garrafones that leave full and do not always come back. Many owners start selling only over the counter and add delivery to grow. That is the right move, because that is where the volume is. It is also where money leaks out if there is no control.

On permits, just the essentials: water for human consumption is regulated in Mexico by NOM-201-SSA1-2015. Check the requirements that apply to you with COFEPRIS and your municipality before opening.

Counter first or delivery from day one

Starting with counter sales only lets you learn the plant with little risk: the customer walks in, pays cash and takes their garrafón. The problem is that volume depends on who happens to pass by.

Starting with delivery from day one gives you volume faster, but it forces you to solve production, the truck, the driver, cash and jugs all at once. A middle path is to open with the counter plus one short route in the nearest neighborhoods, and add a second route once the first one pays for itself.

Either way, keep separate numbers for each part from the start. If you do not know how much the plant makes and how much each route makes, you will not know what to grow.

A normal day at a small water plant

This is what a typical day looks like for a plant with one or two routes:

1. Early, production: washing empty garrafones, filling and sealing, based on what the routes and the day's orders will need.
2. Loading: each truck leaves with counted product and a cash float for change, and someone writes down what went on each one.
3. The route: between 20 and 40 stops, depending on the area. At each one the driver sells, collects or extends credit, picks up empty jugs and, sometimes, fills up on gasoline.
4. Return and settlement: the cash is counted, compared against sales, and the team checks how much product and how many garrafones came back.
5. At night: the owner reviews how much was sold, how much was collected and how much is still owed.

If step 4 gets skipped or pushed to "tomorrow", differences pile up and there is no way to know where they came from. To plan the routes themselves, read how to organize water delivery routes.

Startup costs almost everyone forgets

The equipment budget is usually done right. What goes wrong are the expenses that never show up in the quote:

• Garrafones. Each customer keeps one or two at home, and you need more at the plant and on the trucks. If you expect 300 customers with two jugs each, that is 600 jugs on the street, plus your rotating stock.
• Cash float. Each driver heads out with change, for example $500 MXN. That money does not earn anything, but it has to exist.
• Gasoline and maintenance. They are paid every day, whether you sell a lot or a little.
• Shrinkage. Broken, scratched or unreturned jugs, leaks, returned product.
• A phone, a data plan and a thermal printer per driver, if you will hand out receipts.
• Customer credit. Once you start extending credit to stores, that money leaves your cash box before it comes back.
• Plant consumables. Filters and parts that need replacing every so often and should be budgeted.

None of them looks big on its own. Together, they are the most common reason a new water plant runs out of cash in its first months.

Pricing and break-even: how much a route actually earns

How to price with VAT included

Customers always get the final price, with VAT (IVA in Mexico) included. What changes is the rate. In general, plain water in containers of 10 liters or more is taxed at 0%, while water in smaller containers, such as bottles and bags, and drinks such as juices and aguas frescas are taxed at 16%. Confirm it with your accountant for your products.

This matters when you calculate your real revenue:

• A 20-liter garrafón at $35 MXN at the 0% rate: the full $35 is revenue.
• A 1-liter bottle at $12 MXN with 16% VAT: your revenue is $10.34 and $1.66 is tax that is not yours.

To set a price, start from your real cost per garrafón, add what it costs to bring it to the door, and then your margin. We go step by step in the real cost per garrafón and per liter.

How many customers a route needs to pay a driver and a truck

Let's run an example with explicit assumptions. The numbers are illustrative; replace them with your area's.

• Home-delivered garrafón price: $35 MXN, 0% rate.
• Cost to produce one garrafón (water, purification, washing, cap, seal and electricity): $8.
• Margin per garrafón: $27.
• Total driver cost, including benefits: $500 per day.
• Truck: $300 in gasoline, $150 for prorated maintenance, tires and insurance, and $200 for rent or vehicle replacement. Total: $650 per day.
• Daily route cost: $1,150.

Break-even is $1,150 divided by $27, about 43 garrafones a day just to pay the driver and the truck. Over six working days, that is about 258 garrafones a week.

If each customer buys 1.5 garrafones a week on average, that route needs around 170 active customers. With stores that buy 10 or 15 jugs per visit, the number drops considerably.

Now the part that decides how much you earn: if the same route sells 70 garrafones a day, it leaves $1,890 in margin minus $1,150 in cost, or $740 a day. Over 26 days that is about $19,000 a month, which still has to pay the plant's rent, base electricity, whoever runs the plant and your own salary. That is why one full route is worth far more than two half-empty ones.

Controls to set up from day one

It is easier to start organized than to fix things later. These three controls protect the most money:

1. Garrafones. Record how many each customer has from the very first loan, and decide whether to charge a deposit. We cover it in tracking loaned garrafones.
2. Credit. Each customer with credit has a limit and a balance that the office and the driver see the same way. New customers pay cash.
3. Daily settlement. Every day, compare expected cash against cash handed in, product loaded against product sold, and jugs that went out against jugs that came back.

At first you can keep this in a well-organized notebook, as long as you review it every day. A system like Repartamos does this from day one with a driver app that works without signal, but the habit matters more than the tool.

Common mistakes in the first six months

• Spending everything on equipment and running out of money for jugs, cash float and gasoline.
• Giving credit to everyone to win customers quickly.
• Lending garrafones without writing down to whom.
• Cutting prices to compete without knowing your cost per jug.
• Building routes around whoever calls first instead of by area and day of the week.
• Leaving the settlement for "tomorrow" or for the weekend.
• Mixing business money with household money.
• An owner who does everything and writes nothing down, because "I'll remember".

Quick checklist

• Budget for jugs, cash float, gasoline, shrinkage and credit, not just equipment.
• Check requirements with COFEPRIS and your municipality before opening.
• Prices always include VAT, at the right rate for each product.
• Work out how many garrafones per day each route needs to pay for itself.
• Record loaned jugs and customer balances from the very first customer.
• Settle every day, no exceptions.
• Review your numbers every night, even if it takes five minutes.