Inspired by Oak Magazine · Brand Feature
The Woder Way
A conversation about clean water, selective filtration® and the ‘slow water’ idea — and why gravity may hold the key to the future of modern filtration. Woder Filters founder Idan Granit lays out his vision.
What does it mean to truly own your water? Woder’s founder answers ten questions — from the grandmother who sparked the mission, to the technology redefining what “clean” really means.
In your own words, what is your company and what problem does it solve, or what experience does it create, that wasn’t being addressed before you entered the market?
Woder started with a conversation between me and my grandmother Rivka. She was a survivor of one of the darkest chapters in human history, and access to clean water was never something she took for granted after that experience. When I was finishing university and thinking about what to do with my life, she was the one who made me see that making clean water accessible to people was something worth doing.
The problem we set out to solve was much bigger than just filtration itself. The U.S. water filter market is crowded, confusing, and misleading. We found that brands were tested to insufficient standards, excessive technical information served to overwhelm rather than inform, and there were too many promises that didn’t hold up. Because of these issues, consumers are often left navigating a maze, unsure which filter addresses their specific needs. Woder cuts through that noise. We make the right information accessible, ensure every product is properly tested, certified, and compliant with U.S. building codes, and we stand behind a simple promise: you get exactly what you’re looking for.
When we started building water filters, TDS (Total Dissolved Solids) meters were one of the most popular devices consumers used to check water quality. The problem with this method, however, is that it cannot tell the difference between beneficial minerals and harmful contaminants because it measures everything dissolved in water equally. Zero TDS simply means distilled water — the kind used in car batteries, not the kind recommended for human consumption. We felt that this must be changed!
Traditional reverse osmosis strips water of both good and bad minerals, while our formula targets impurities while letting healthy minerals pass through. In addition to our selective filtration process, our approach targets the main contamination challenges across the US: PFAS, lead and heavy metals, and fluoride.
What principles guide how you develop products? We’re interested in the philosophy behind your decisions around materials, functionality, aesthetics, and sustainability, and how those priorities play off each other.
Most people know a great deal about the food they eat. They typically know where it is grown, how it was raised, and what is in it. Yet when it comes to the water they drink, there’s a striking lack of awareness. Where the water comes from, how it travels to its faucet, and what it picks up along the way is widely unknown. At Woder, we believe this needs to change.
We draw inspiration from the Slow Food movement, which for over two decades has championed the idea that food grown closer to us is better for us and better for the planet. We apply that same philosophy to water but call it slow water. We believe that tap water should be as pure and nourishing as spring water, retaining the essential local minerals that nature intended it to carry. And just as the Slow Food movement returned the ownership of food back to the individual and the community, we believe the same should be true for water.
For us, the filtration mechanism inside the cartridge is paramount. That’s what sets us apart, and it’s the area we invest in the most. The rest of the system, including the housing, the fittings, and the form, specifically exist to ensure it fits your plumbing and that the water flows properly. We don’t over-engineer or add complexity for the sake of aesthetics. We believe that every element should earn its place.
Woder® Advanced Selective Filtration™ focuses on doing one thing exceptionally well: giving you water that is clean, mineral-rich, and truly yours.
How would you describe the person you designed this product for? What are they looking for, and why do existing options fall short for them?
We designed our product for everyday American homeowners. For the people who are health-conscious and want to know that the water coming out of their tap is safe to drink, but who are also overwhelmed by too many options and unclear guidance.
The way I think about it is simple: I imagine my father is the one shopping for a water filter. I know he would be willing to put in the effort to find the right one, but I also know he might become overwhelmed with the abundance of options, technical information, and confusing installation instructions. This image drives not only the design of our product, but the design of the entire experience around it. We believe when looking for a product, the information must be clear enough for people to make the right choice with confidence, and the installation must be straightforward enough for customers to handle it on their own.
What specifically sets this product apart from the alternatives a well-informed buyer would be comparing it against? Skip the marketing language here. We’re after the honest, real-world differences.
The most common alternative is a reverse osmosis (RO) system. RO systems focus on achieving low or zero TDS levels in water. While they do deliver great filtration and produce noticeably clearer ice cubes, it comes at a cost. RO strips both beneficial minerals and harmful contaminants from the water. The result is pure water in the laboratory sense, but not in the sense that matters for daily human consumption. RO systems are expensive, demanding to maintain, and waste a significant amount of water in the process.
Woder does not strive to produce low or zero TDS water. We believe in our Advanced Selective Filtration™ system and trust it to deliver clean water that also preserves the healthy minerals our bodies need.
Other systems manufactured abroad, mainly in China or Taiwan, may undercut us on price. Those brands also tend to compete on capacity. While some of these systems are very good, the problem is that the cartridge lifespan is not based on a fixed number. It depends almost entirely on the quality of your local municipal water. For example, a system rated for 10,000 gallons in one city may clog within months in another. Advertising capacity without acknowledging this variability can result in an incomplete picture.
Tell us about the development process for this product. What were the key decisions, and were there moments where you had to choose one priority over another?
Our earlier generations (Gen 1, 2, and 3) used housings sourced from a third-party supplier. For a time, this arrangement made sense, but when several systems failed, we had to learn a hard lesson: a supplier can walk away from a problem in a way that you, the brand, simply cannot. As a brand, the responsibility lands with you regardless of where the fault lies, and that was not a position we were willing to stay in.
The decision to internally manufacture our housing systems was not cheap, and it took us a couple of years just to match the quality housings of our ex-supplier. But we knew that owning the entire product was the only way to own the outcome and be responsible for it.
How does your product line change over time? What drives those updates: technology, customer feedback, market shifts, or something else?
Our original instinct was to focus mainly on our proprietary filtration mechanism within our cartridges. But we believe that building a product that people trust in their homes means being accountable for every component, not just the part you’re most proud of. Every new generation of Woder is focused on how we can improve our systems and make them better for our customers. We value our customer feedback and keep it top of mind while designing all components of future iterations.
How do you think about the relationship between price and value in your category? Where does your product sit, and why is that the right position for it?
We believe Woder filters are priced above the category average for good reason. We strive to support American workers and their surrounding communities by fully manufacturing our products in the United States. And we believe our Advanced Selective Filtration system is unmatched.
Our one-year guarantee means our customers are buying a full year of clean water at a fixed price. If the cartridge falls short for any reason (most of the time, it comes down to local municipal water quality), we make it right by shipping a new one with no conditions attached.
What does your after-sale experience look like? How do you handle support, feedback, and the ongoing relationship with someone who’s bought from you?
Every purchase is followed by a personal thank you for your business email with installation instructions included. We end the email with the same line every time, “I’ll be here if you need anything.” We never use chatbots or frustrating ticketing systems. We have real team members available to respond to and assist our customers with their every need.
What we’re most proud of is how rarely our customers need to reach out. The vast majority of people who buy a Woder filter never contact us after the sale — and we take that as a meaningful signal. It tells us that our online selection wizard is doing its job, guiding customers to the right product for their specific needs before they buy. It tells us that our product pages are informative enough to answer the questions people have. And it tells us that when the filter arrives, the installation is exactly what we promised: fast, simple, and straightforward.
What’s ahead for the brand? New products, new markets, new directions. Anything you can share about where you’re headed?
The next chapter for Woder is built on the idea that the best solutions are the ones that work with nature rather than against it. We’ve been fortunate to find a like-minded local company with best-in-class gravity filtration technology. Gravity naturally filtered water long before technology existed — pulling water through the earth, through layers of mineral-rich rock, producing the kind of pure, natural spring water we’ve spent years trying to replicate at the tap. This is a direction that feels true to everything Woder has stood for since the beginning: simple, natural, and built to last.
Is there something about your brand or this product that you feel rarely comes across in press coverage? Consider this an open floor.
We’re genuinely grateful that Oak Magazine thought to ask not just about what we manufacture, but about the why behind what we’re manufacturing.
Woder is a water filtration brand. But moreover, it is a consumer advocacy brand that is committed to the people who buy our products and the people who help us build them. The reason we developed our Advanced Selective Filtration™ system is because we believe that stripping water of everything, beneficial minerals included, is the wrong answer. We believe that water, like food, deserves more attention and respect. And at the heart of that philosophy is something we felt strongly enough about to trademark:
