GREENVILLE, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) — This year’s ‘Coolest Thing Made in Wisconsin,’ as chosen by state-wide voters, happens to be an appliance made in the Fox Valley.
The winner, the Bevi Bottleless Water Dispenser, is manufactured by Plexus Corporation in Greenville.
After one month of competition and more than 187,000 votes, it was crowned as this year’s Coolest Thing Made in Wisconsin. To celebrate, a trophy presentation took place at the company’s Appleton plant Tuesday where the machine is made.
“The great thing about Bevi is it combines innovation and sustainability into a single product to build a better world,” said Todd Kelsey, CEO of Plexus.
Kelsey says across Bevi’s customer base, those people have saved the equivalent of 400 million plastic water bottles.
“Not only a great product, but really great for the planet as well,” he said.
Bevi is a smart water dispenser which supplies on-demand filtered, flavored and sparkling water. It gives consumers the ability to customize their drink 40,000 different ways.
“My job as the manager of operations is to make sure all the pieces come together, the engineering team, the support staff and the operators who actually build the units from day to day,” said David Strachan, Manager of Operations at Plexus.
Strachan says they’ve been producing the Bevi unit for about two years.
Once the Bevi unit is built, it gets a full functionality test.
“Units are being turned on, there’s an automated system that simulates a consumer actually selecting their beverage and water flows through as if it’s in a cafeteria somewhere else out in the field,” said Strachan.
More than 100 products were nominated for the contest this year. Strachan says to help lead a team that built the coolest product, is really exciting.
“And to think that our product made it all the way to the top and being recognized this way is just awesome for the plant, everybody on the floor is really thrilled to have this happen,” he said.
Out of the final four products who competed for the Coolest Thing Made in Wisconsin trophy, three were from Northeast Wisconsin.
