Wellness encompasses a lot of things, from the water you drink to the supplements you take. No one knows that better than Hudson Davis-Ross, who cofounded buzzy supplement brand Plant People. For him, wellness starts with hydration — here’s the much-loved water filter that ensures he gets his eight a day.

“I think I am definitely a fanatic about products,” says Hudson Davis-Ross, CEO and cofounder of Plant People, a doctor-formulated gummy supplement brand rooted in functional mushrooms, adaptogens, and botanicals. “I’m really into products that may not be flashy, but they’re sort of systemic. They impact me on a daily basis, and they’re something that I use a lot.”

So when his wife asks what to get him as a gift, he avoids latching on to the latest trendy products for ideas, and goes for what can make his life better on a daily basis. “Then I find myself in a situation where the things that I want are things that aren’t really gifts,” Davis-Ross says. “They're the kind of things that just make my life easier.”

Drinking enough water is often thought of as the first step to feeling your best self, so it’s no surprise that this wellness-minded founder has a Waterdrop filter at the top of his list. 

“A great example is I bought this reverse-osmosis system,” he says. “It’s the Waterdrop. It’s not flashy, and that’s kind of why I love it.” 

Davis-Ross’s passion for practical done right stems from his own work at Plant People, where he sees the impact a well-thought-out product — whether a vitamin gummy or a water filter — has on people’s everyday lives.

“Plant People started out of my apartment,” he says. “Now we’re the No. 1 supplement brand in multiple categories at Whole Foods, Sprouts, Erewhon, and Target now. Every day I wake up to amazing reviews from people about how it helped their kids or their parents or themselves, and the impact it’s made on their lives. The deep impact that you make on people’s lives when it comes to sleep, stress, anxiety, cognition, just general wellness, is just a really impactful thing.”

So, when it came to figuring out how to improve the water that he and his family rely on every day, he gave it the same attention he brings to his own brand.

“I spend a lot of time thinking about what goes in my body, whether it’s food, supplements or hydration,” he says. “Water is one of those things that we consume all day, every day, right? Every glass of water, every cup of coffee, the smoothies, the water that I give to my son. It’s just nice that it starts from a cleaner source… It’s an RO system. It’s not super cool, but I know a lot of people who I’ve referred it to have been super happy that they ended up getting it.”

Out of sight, out of mind 

“What’s really nice is the product design,” says Davis-Ross. “It goes underneath the sink. It’s not huge. This is especially nice if you’re limited on counter space, or if you’re just someone who likes to keep things neatly tucked away in the kitchen.” 

The smart faucet attachment also makes it easy to see what’s coming out of your faucet with the display right on it.

“It has a display on it that shows you the amount of contaminants that is in the water that you’re drinking,” he says. “It’s actually kind of nice to see it while you’re using it and get that reassurance that it’s cleaning the water. It’s always really low: It’s like, 10 or 20 contaminants per billion or something.”

The biggest drawback, according to Davis-Ross, is the price. 

“It’s expensive,” he says. “The way I think about it is, if you spend a lot of time at home and just drinking water, which I think most humans do, I think it’s well worth it. It’s kind of like people who drink and smoke cigarettes, but they only eat organic. I feel kind of the same thing, which is, if you’re eating well and you take care of your body, you should really start with something that you have multiple touch points with.”

If you’re on the fence, Davis-Ross says the brand has the research to back up its performance. 

“They have all these studies that they’ve done for the products, and they can prove that it’s taken out a lot of contaminants,” he says. “They’re really well-rated. It’s NSF-certified. It has a 4.6 on Amazon with a thousand-plus reviews. That’s hard to do.”

Filtered water without the wait — or guesswork

Of course, we all want cleaner water. But, if you have to stand around and wait for it to get clean, that takes away convenience points.

“The water tastes great,” Davis-Ross says. “It comes out really quickly, too. It’s not slow. It’s connected to the sink, so it comes right out of the faucet. It’s not like a Brita where you have to put it in [and wait],” he says.

You can even get additions like a mineral cartridge to add good stuff back into the filtered water.

“It has this mineral cartridge that you add,” he says. “It re-adds minerals so that you’re not losing the minerals that you get from water. In general, it’s just really seamless.”

Davis-Ross’s favorite part about the system is that it takes the guesswork out filter replacements. The “best part,” he says, is that “it tells you when the cartridges, the filters, are low. It’s generally every six months. It’s amazing.”

Davis-Ross says he wouldn’t change a thing about this water filtration system. 

“I think it’s a really solid product,” he says. “It’s quiet. It’s great. They’re really well rated, and I highly recommend it.”