You can very easily go with the cheaper alternatives for most baby-related items. In fact you probably should, for the most part, I’d say the baby industry is a racket!
Anyway, there are a few things that you really should not go cheap on, and today I’d like to talk about one of those items, it is the venerable Diaper Genie. It’s not a cute item, it’s not a “showcase item” in the baby room. It’s pretty much all function, not much to look at, relatively unobtrusive. However, it’s one of the most critical items in that room.
You can get the basic model for 20 some-odd bucks. You change the diaper, you lift the lid, you toss it in. Big Deal! Right?
Then you look over at the Diaper Genie Elite. Oh. This one has a carbon filter, a baking soda puck holder, and a foot pedal that opens the lid.
“Hmm.” You think, “What’s the price?”, The price is about ten to fifteen dollars more.
“Meh” You think, as you toss the basic model into your cart.
Don’t do it. Put that basic model back on the shelf, bite the bullet and get that Elite model.
Seriously, you want this upgrade. You will be using this thing many times a day, every day. The crib rails will get chew marks, those pretty crib sheets will be poop and puke stained, that gorgeous cherry wood dresser will have a Disney Princess sticker (then another, and another and another after that) stuck on it. The Diaper Genie Elite will still be there, loyal, stoic, ready to do its job, always ready.
Does the carbon filter work? I don’t know, I’m onto baby #2, I’m immune to the scent of poop. So, yeah, sure! The filter thingamajig works! (?) I could have a childless friend swing by sometime and I could ask him if the carbon filter works . . . as if I can tell the difference, or care anymore.
It’s the foot controlled lid that does it for me. If you are expecting your first, you cannot yet wrap your mind around just how many diapers you will go through. I have stopped thinking in terms of numbers of diapers, and I have started wondering how many pounds of diapers we go through, how many pounds of poop, and pee and the weird in-between stuff I have hauled out of my home. You cannot wrap your mind around how many epic diaper failures you will be dealing with. And I’m not knocking the diaper industry here! The Hoover Dam can’t resist some of the things my daughter’s sphincter has launched upon our pristine world.
I guess what I’m getting at, is there are going to be many moments in which you will not have an available hand to lift that lid. If you’re by yourself, that foot pedal is the closest thing you will ever have to a human assistant. The diaper is a sopping chunky dripping mess, it’s on your forearms, it’s on your tee shirt, it shot up the baby’s back, it’s on her foot (because she freaked out and began kicking just as you suction-peeled that ruin of a diaper off of her) She’s screaming and trying to roll off the changing table, two hands can barely keep this diaper together. One hand can barely keep her on the changing table. A single beam of sunlight then hits that foot pedal, a chorus of angels begins singing; the loyal, nondescript Diaper Genie ELITE opens it’s maw and turns that diaper into a closed chapter in your life.
Break out the wallet, buy the upgrade.
For the record, I have no skin in the game here. This is not a compensated endorsement. Playtex isn’t paying me nor sending me any free stuff. Though if they wanted to . . .