Fresh Baby & My 1st Giveaway! 3
I talked with the CEO of Fresh Baby and she agreed to send me some of their products to test and review (and give away! More on that below). Overall I love her things, but this is a review, not an advertisement. So I’ll be telling you both what I like and don’t like about them. I’ll start by taking a look at a unique plate they designed.
But first I wanted to give a little information about the company itself. Fresh Baby is a company that has been working with quite a few WIC clinics. They sell a lot of products designed to help people realize fresh healthy food is fun and easy to feed your baby and young child. Fresh Baby also has a free healthy eating email newsletter.
Now onto the review.
Concept of the Plate
It’s a divided plate that makes healthy eating fun by giving a visual reminder regarding the food portions we ought to be giving our kids. I’m going to guess here but it looks like about 40% of the plate is space for fruits and veggies, 30% is for protien, and 30% is for whole grains. It’s a great reminder (both to us and our kids) that our meals should include plenty of fruits and veggies.
Obviously if you’re serving whole grain speghetti with meat sauce and lots of purreed veggies hiding in the sauce, this plate doesn’t work perfectly for that meal. But often this plate is a great way to make a healthy meal fun to eat! And even if the foods don’t fit in each category neatly you are reminded to make sure your meal includes protien, whole grains, and plenty of produce!
Contruction of the Plate
It’s BPA free, lead free, 100% melamine (like a hard plastic), dishwasher safe, not for use in microwave, and made in China. My grandma used to have melamine plates for us kids, and she did put them in the microwave all the time, and she had them forever. I think it caused them to slightly discolor, and I recall them also sometimes getting very hot to the touch. So I definitely would not recommend someone testing out the plate in the microwave. But the plates are definitely sturdy; they’re going to hold up. They aren’t flexible or flimsy.
I am a little disappointed in the quality of them. I’m nitpicking here but I do want to give an honest review. One of them appears to have a small blackish gray stain (smaller than a nickel) on the bottom of it and another has a super small dark mark (it looks like a little string of fuzz but it clearly isn’t going anywhere) on the divided rim. They also felt just a touch grainy in the spots where the food is supposed to go. It didn’t take me long to realize that this could be washed off and I guess we should be washing plates before the first time we use them anyway, but I was still surpised to feel a little grit on the plates.
Fun Factor
These plates definitely win for making healthy eating fun! They’re very colorful (to remind you to eat a rainbow of colors). My 3 year old and 5 year old think the plates look awesome, and my 5 year old asked if she could eat off one of these plates every day so it would help her remember all the healthy yummy things she is supposed to eat. And as cheesey as it may sound, I would feel so proud of myself and think it was super fun to give them a meal that fit in this plate perfectly!
Price
Fresh Baby sells these plates for $8.95 + shipping. Shipping was going to be $6.95 for my address. This is definitely not priced for your average WIC mother’s budget (although it can be bought along with her cookbook for $12.95 before shipping, and that cookbook is a definite winner).
WIC clinics can, however, buy these plates from Fresh Baby in bulk and they are considerably cheaper (less than $4 each). So if you’re interested in purchasing these for yourself, contact your WIC clinic about it. Maybe you can help get these into the hands of other WIC moms in your area by doing so!
Usefulness to the WIC Program
I think these plates would make a good match for a WIC clinic that is offering nutritional and cooking classes to give as a door prize for moms who attend. They can be bought in both English and Spanish! I doubt this is something WIC clinics can budget to give to every single toddler it serves, but most clinics probably do have the budget to buy these as an incentive to encourage healthy eating somehow. And I think this is one prize that would encourage healthy eating long after the prize was earned.
I used to lead a breastfeeding support group and I think this would be an awesome gift to give moms at the support group who were able to sucessfully breastfeed their babies the entire first year. Or just to give as a door prize for a nutritional class. Many WIC families drop out when their child is between the ages of 1 and 4. I actually think this would be a nice parting gift for WIC to give clients to help remind them and their child to continue to make healthy eating choices. As I said, I’m not sure what most WIC budgets are for items like this, so I’m not 100% sure how an almost $4 plate fits into a WIC’s budget best. I do think that it is worth WIC clinics looking into, though.
Giveaway!
I’m giving away two of these plates. To enter this giveaway, all you need to do is “like” Fresh Baby and WIC woes on Facebook (both pages). I just created my Facebook page for WIC woes today, so you’ll get to be my first fans!
You can also get additional entries, increasing your chances of winning. Share this post to your Facebook wall for another entry. If you blog about this giveaway, I’ll enter you in the drawing 2 additional times. You can also tweet it out daily, and I’ll give you another entry each time you do (as long as you have @wicwoes and the link in your tweet, I’ll see it and count it).
Please leave a comment below letting me know if you liked the facebook pages, if you shared it to your wall, and a link to your post if you blogged about it. I’ll announce the winner in 2 weeks (on June 3rd).
Overall, I’d give this plate 8.5 out of 10 stars. I definitely think my two lucky winners are going to be super pleased!
$4, even for a bulk purchase, might be too high for some WIC programs, depending on how much they can spend (per item) on incentives.
I have “like”d both pages and shared on my FB page. I would blog and tweet if I could but I don’t do either. I already spend too much time online as it is!!!
I really enjoy your blog, it is very well done.
I am a fan of both on Facebook! Thanks, I’m glad I found your blog! :)
The plate is super cute! Even at only $4 a plate it is not in our budget at this time, but I will hop on facebook and “like” the pages so I can be entered to win! My toddler will think this plate is super cool! I have just one question- Is the winner required to pay shipping?