Designer Pampers Unboxing

[DailyDi]

Found them at Target today. $14.99 for a box of 23. I like that they are in a box, and will be saving those boxes to store diapers in the museum

To my surprise: You don't get all the prints in one box. You get two prints per pack, and some of the prettier girl prints were already gone - like the pink lace print in the ads.

They are very thin diapers with the Drymax sub-brand. Cloth-like cover of course, but the designs are nice.

[Sophie ♥]

I don't see the visual appeal... but it was the same with the Huggies Jeans ones. I just don't get it.

To me, baby diapers should look babyish. White with a tape of some popular television show on the front. Or something with small, childish designs all around. You know? It's like dressing your five year old in a business suit. There's really no point other than the "oh, that's new" factor.

But it's early and I am being a brat.

-Sophie

[babyforyou]

They look all most like the new depend pull ups with the prints.

[thickdiaperedbaby]

I agree, they look horrible. Though, I do like the fact that they come in a box.

[Dirty Diaper/Maxipad Lover]

I saw these in one of my local Target's today; they had the lace print on shelves there too. I admittedly won't be buying these, not unless some other AB/DL hands me the money to do so and says "treat yourself," and I'll explain why.

You know that "Get a Mac" ad, where Mac asks PC what he's going to do this year, and PC replies "copy everything that you did last year;" replace the word Mac with KCWW and the word PC with P&G, and you have a pretty good analogy. KCWW came up with the "Huggies Jeans," which they've run in different parts of the world at different times. The pattern has changed slightly, for example, the US ones are the first to feature a "Little Movers" tag, but that's because other regions didn't have the "Little Movers" line. Overall, the "Huggies Jeans" are similar from region to region, with different packaging and an occasional modification to the print. They cost the same as regular Huggies diapers, they have the same quantity as regular Huggies diapers, and are available for a little over two months before they're discontinued. They're a unisex design for diapers that have unisex functionality. This is the smart way to do "limited edition" diapers, which admittedly have an acknowledged collectible value, or at the very least, a perceived one.

In contrast, P&G's "designer diapers" almost seemed like they were a reactive concept rather than a proactive one. Rather than fixing the sides on UnderJams or ensuring that the new SAP used in the Cruisers Dry-Max line is safe, they decided to do their own "limited edition" diapers. These couldn't be any limited edition diapers though, in P&G's corporate mind, they had to make Huggies Jeans seem boring. It was almost as if their marketing department came up with the idea that "Jeans are for 'commoners,' but designer diapers are 'high class' products."

The problem wasn't even the concept of designer diapers, but rather, the execution. First, P&G hired a fashion designer, which is so far into the realm of overkill it'd be laughable if it didn't hurt the product, but more on that in a moment. Second, they decided that one design wouldn't suffice, but instead, they needed 11 designs, again overkill is an understatement. The third stupid mistake was only offering the 11 designs in sizes three and four; if you have 11 designs, why not spread them across sizes three, four, and five, or three, four, five, and even six or seven; it's not like there's a shortage of designs--even if P&G released one design on sizes N-7, they'd still have three additional designs that they could have used on something like Easy-Ups.

What really annoys me though is that the designer Pampers could've been great. For the first time in years, we finally have gender-specific diapers again in the US, at least for a month or two, or rather, we have gender-specific designs. After the "classic classy cardboard" packaging, the gender-specific designs, the big name designer, and the 11 prints, I'm disappointed that P&G didn't run gender-specific diapers rather than the standard "unisex" ones. The designs for girls should have more padding in the center, and the designs for boys should have more padding in the front like the old single-gender diapers did. This was a huge oversight; I could've rationalized gender specific designs if we had gender-specific diapers to go with them, but these are unisex diapers with gender-specific designs.

The real nail in the coffin for the Pampers designer diapers though is the Target exclusivity and the price tag. I could walk into multiple stores with no relation to each other and purchase Huggies Jeans, I could purchase them for the same price as any other Huggies Little Movers diapers that were on shelves, but the same cannot be said about the Pampers designer diapers. If I want Pampers designer diapers, I have to go to Target, and then I have to pay virtually double the price of a "regular" package of Pampers in a comparable size. Oh sure, both the "Jumbo" package of regular Pampers and the "Jumbo" package of the designer Pampers are about the same price per package, but what matters is the quantity within the package, which in the case of the designer diapers, is roughly half that of the regular Pampers diapers. Again, I might even be able to justify this if the designer diapers had gender-specific padding, but they don't.

The bottom line is that P&G could have probably cooked up comparable designs on their own, at a fraction of the cost to slap a fashion designer's name on their diapers, and they may very well have had a product worth purchasing. As it stands though, these pale (or perhaps that should be pail, as in "diaper pail") in comparison to Huggies Jeans, which were fun, readily accessible, and didn't break the bank.

In truth, I wouldn't mind if KCWW and P&G went with diapers that looked like clothing as a regular thing, although I'd hope that they'd create the designs themselves. Likewise, I'd welcome a return to gender-specific diapers, even if they retained the prints of current diapers. One way or another though, I think it'd be nice for the general design of diapers to change again. Prior to the early 2000's, Luvs was the only diaper that really featured a "character," and that was Barney. Last decade we got Disney on KCWW's Huggies and Sesame Street on P&G's Pampers, while P&G dropped Barney for Blues Clues on Luvs. I would love to see KCWW and P&G drop all of these designs from baby diapers (training pants are another story,) and return to original, gender-specific designs.

Finally, let me say this: Limited edition diapers are a gimmick, but at least KCWW's were a gimmick that didn't cost anymore than the regular diapers that they were sold next too. Disposable diapers with prints resembling clothing are a nice change of pace, but it's possible to create such prints internally, and to sell them as a regular item. KCWW and P&G can still make a big deal out of changing the designs once a year, they can put the year that a particular design was first released on the packaging, and still drive up any actual or perceived collectible value of their diapers. In any case, the designer diapers look nice, but the price is an absurd rip-off. I expect better from P&G, especially when they go crazy hiring a fashion designer and doing gender-specific prints. Maybe next year if KCWW or P&G try this again, they can do "limited edition" diapers that are "throwbacks" to an old design from several years ago, kind of like when sports teams wear uniforms from their past. Again, it's just a thought.

[AutieAB]

They look all most like the new depend pull ups with the prints.

I thought the same thing. Difference is that they actually hold pee

[stinky marluxia]

I think its dumb that they only come in sizes 3 and 4 when bigger babies wanna look just as cute an adorable as the smaller babies thats the thing noone thinks about even adult diapers should come somewhat fashionable