Honest Company Review – Diapers and Essentials – Part 1

SEE PART 2 (FAMILY ESSENTIALS PACK) REVIEW HERE.

Probably you’ve heard about the Honest Company if you’re a parent, super-green, or obsessed with the gorgeousness that is Jessica Alba. Here’s a review of their products (Long Story Short: I really like them, you just have to determine for some items if it’s worth the cost).

First things first – if you sign up (even for a trial pack!), I would greatly appreciate it if you would use my referral link. It’ll get us a a few dollars off on our next shipment of things for Ainsley to poop in!

A while back, I jumped on board and got a sample pack of the Honest Company diapers and wipes. Mostly, lets be honest (ha! puns), because they are FREAKING ADORABLE. I mean diapers with skulls and crossbones or stars? Flowers? Adorable plaid? I’M IN. And I DID also like the fact that they are made with no icky stuff. I honestly (I am not being punny EVERY time I say this, swear) wanted to cloth diaper, but it was yet another hurdle in finding local, part-time, infant daycare that we could afford and liked. So we just went disposable (maybe we’ll try cloth next time, since we’ll be more prepared with the sitter situation).

We had previously been using Pampers – both Baby Dry and Swaddlers, and had been very happy with them. In the early days, the wetness indicator on the Swaddlers was helpful, but as time goes on you sort of don’t need that any more. We also tried Walmart brand diapers – they worked fine and A had no adverse reactions, but they had a smell that I just didn’t like. We’ve used (and are currently using, along with Honest) Target brand, too. They aren’t “green,” but haven’t caused any rashes etc, don’t smell weird like the Walmart ones, and have a cute gender-neutral green and blue dot pattern. We’ve also tried Fisher Price, and those were fine all around (not a particularly cute print, but it was fine). We have some Seventh Generation ones to try, but they’re the next size up so we haven’t gotten to use them yet. I will say that the Honest ones are a bit thicker than the “evil” kind. Presumably because actual natural absorbent stuff takes up more room than absorbent chemicals. It’s not noticeable under clothes or anything the way cloth diapers can be (just bc they’re bigger), but it is noticeable when you, say, go back to Target brand after using Honest for a while exclusively. [EDIT 1/3/13: We avoid Target brand now, since if they get even a drop of pee in them, it looks like she has a giant load in her pants. We now use Luvs, which are only slightly more than Target brand (like $1 per box) and work just as well as the Pampers or fancier brands.]

Honest butt…way back in June!

Sidenote here: Yes, it IS sort of dumb to want to buy the cute diapers, But you know what? I see those damn things all day long. So if they have frigging Elmo or Pooh or something stupid on them, then every time I see them I’ll think “OMG I hate that stupid Elmo.” When you buy underwear for yourself, you buy cute ones because you want cute underwear. Because they make you happy. You don’t buy yourself Elmo underwear if Elmo annoys the crap out of you (and if you are not 3, but). Well, cute things for Ainsley to poop in make me happy. So whatever.

As for the “green” angle…No, Ainsley has not had any problems with the other diapers made with whatever evil chemicals. But when I read about stuff like the recent explosion at a plant that makes a chemical big in diapers, it’s just….ugh. Acrylic acid, the chemical in question, is an absorbent but also corrosive skin irritant. Though I’m sure they test to make sure it doesn’t get through to baby’s little butt, it’s still….sketchy. Companies like Honest and Seventh Generation (and cloth!) don’t use that stuff. So even though she’s fine with the chemical laden ones, it doesn’t give me the sketch feeling when I know it’s not in there (hey…diapers with Elmo AND acid! yay! ha).

So the ice creams were not my fave pattern…for some reason the ice cream swirls reminded me of poop (even though they were pink). But…still cute.

So ANYWAY. I really like the Honest Company diapers, even aside from the cuteness. They don’t have leak problems unless A has a particularly pee-filled night, and they stay on her well (and keep poop in!). I will say that they tend to run slightly small. We had to really stretch using her size 2s, because I ordered another month worth since she still fit in the Fisher Price and Target size 2s but the Honest 2s are smaller….so we sent the slightly too small 2s to daycare for a couple weeks so she could deal with it (ha – sorry Katie!). I wouldn’t say to order up a size because they’re not THAT small, but maybe go up a size if you know you’re at the tail-end of whatever size you’re on with your current brand.

As for the wipes, I didn’t like them at first, but they listened to complaints and fixed them! Now they come out of the package nicely, are comfortably thick, and work well. Plus, they are made with all safe stuff so you can wipe down butts, hands, faces, food trays, etc with them safely. (I use other wipes for that, too, but I guess technically you shouldn’t?) I’d say they are comparable to Huggies Natural Care, which is otherwise our go-to wipe. (I have those on Subscribe and Save from Amazon, but make sure you watch the price…sometimes you have to cancel for a few months bc they randomly raise the price to crazy levels.) The Honest wipes come in a cute, soft package, but it can easily be cut open if you want to use a pop-up dispenser. Currently, we use the Huggies in the popup and pack the Honest for daycare and travel.

SIDENOTE: I’m sure you’ve also heard people mention how effing CUTE all the packaging is for the Honest stuff. It really is cute and does make me feel sorta fancypants when I use it. Which, again, is stupid. But let’s not lie, we’re all like that.

So…final verdict? I really like these diapers, but they are clearly more expensive than the Target brand[/Luvs] ones. I did some math early on and at the time, the monthly subscription price from Honest made it so they were about 2¢ per diaper more expensive than the Pampers Baby Dry…BUT that doesn’t account for the fact that you ALSO get wipes with the Honest ones. So after factoring that in, they are really even. I still have my diaper subscription active with Honest, but if you go in once a month or so, you can keep pushing back your delivery date by 30 days. So I’ll get a box occasionally to make me happy, but they are not our ‘all the time’ diaper. Now, for example, I don’t have another shipment coming until mid-December (which I can still push back in a month if I need to). I like that they are safer (even though the evil ones have no signs of evil for us) and goddammit, I love that they’re cute. Those little skulls and crossbones just make me happy!

I love these diapers! And totally beach appropriate, right??

…Since this turned into a CRAZY LONG review, I will do the ‘essentials’ review separately. Part 2 coming soon! The essentials pack is useful even if you don’t have kids!

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