My Buddy-Box | mamavsteacher

I like to think of myself reasonably environmentally friendly, no doubt I could a lot to improve though. We do recycle a lot of our household waste and we use some cloth nappies, although not full time. We don’t throw away much food at all and we are pretty good with putting more jumpers on before using the heating. Although we did recently find out that we’d had the emersion heater on for the entire 5 years since we moved into our house!! Who knew?!

When I offered the chance to work with MyBuddy-Box I was extremely intrigued by the product. These boxes provide an improved, permanent and reliable way of transporting groceries but it is much better value for money than any bag for life, hessian bag out there. These boxes not only have thousands of uses but will last for decades with constant use.

So who better to put this to use than a family with a toddler?! Toddlers are great as a way of testing out the durability of products. So whilst we were making dinner one evening, I let him loose on it! And Sprog’s verdict is that it works extremely well as a toy car. He also loved carrying it around in what I’ve been calling ‘briefcase mode’!

It was after this however, that I realised that the box has sections which slide over the edges to strengthen the places where it folds down and that did please me. I had been worried about it would maintain a strong shape whilst loading it at the checkout but it turns out that I hadn’t looked carefully enough.

Here’s a few of the practical uses that I have found for MyBuddy-Box. I used it, rather successfully, to bring all 60 of the exercise books home that need marking over half term, plus some assessments too. I really like that the handles have a bit of padding on the top so that as I’m carrying the box it isn’t cutting into my hands too badly.

I also tried it out at the supermarket and found it great for picking up a few bits and pieces. It was so easy to put everything into the box, Sprog is particularly keen to help with this, empty the box onto the checkout, reload the box and put in the car. All whilst feeling a little smug that I had not used a single plastic bag! I’m not sure on the practicalities of using it to do a weekly shop though as I’m not sure how well they would stack up in the trolley after checkout. They do have handy corner tabs to hold down to help with that so it should work well.

I also love a company with a good ethical purpose and these guys are definitely on the right track with this. In October the plastic bag tax comes into force and they want to support us as consumers, and environmentalists, to be able to tackle that in the most sensible ways.

I was disappointed to hear from them that the supermarkets that they had approached were not interested in the product at this time. I can’t really understand this. I’m rubbish with plastic bags and bags for life. This we offers me a much stronger solution, particularly when buying bottles of squash, cartons of milk and the gallons of wine (ahem, only in my dreams) from the supermarket to the car.

I think my only criticisms of the product are that when it initially arrived, I saw the design and aesthetically it’s really not very me. But a quick stop at the website later, and I realised that there are many more designs including one which looks like a wicker basket (much more me!) so I was completely reassured by that. I also worry a little about the £14.99 purchase price of it as I do wonder if busy mum’s and dad’s will be able to justify that amount of money. However, we must remember that this product will last for years, it is hard wearing and incredibly practical so without my cheapo head on, it is a very sensible investment. They do also offer plain black or blue boxes at a cheaper price of £9.99 and for everyone who uses the code BURGESS at the checkout, you can have free P&P on us!