Why cloth nappies?

Why cloth nappies?

Ok so why did we choose to use cloth nappies for our baby. Well long before I was pregnant or had a baby I used to babysit, nanny and work with young children; I would often wonder when changing nappies how much waste they create. Well about 6 years ago my cousin had a baby and used cloth nappies. I remember looking at them and thinking they weren't scary or difficult. When I became pregnant we researched it further and have to say  we were convinced that they would save us lots of money especially as we want at least 2 children. We talked to my cousin about their savings and we decided to do it. 

The cost factor

For arguments sake the average child potty trains about 2.5 years old and wears on average 6 nappies a day. On average that's 5475 nappy changes so even with the cheapest boots nappies which work out to about 11p each is £602.25 for 2.5 years. Nappy sacks cost around £28 for this time period. Baby wipes on average is about 2 packs a week cost £195. If you on average went swimming once a week that's £65 on swim nappies (50p each). So in total for 2.5 years is around £890.25!! This is based on minimum cost for nappies. With the minimum cost of 20 cloth nappies, reusable wipes, wet bags, nappy bucket and liners being £140 you must be crazy not to cloth nappy. Including a birth to potty swim nappy at £10, let's say for arguments sake for holiday I brought two then my total spend on nappies would be £160 total. Also cloth nappies can be used on more than one child. If I had two children and used disposable nappies it would have cost £1780.50 in cloth nappies I would reuse the same nappies so it would cost £80 a child(divided the cost by two children, however if you had 3 children £53.34. Then nappies can be sold on to others after you are finished with them.

In case you need more proof here's an article on what it costs Cloth vs disposable price comparison

The environmental factor

In the media there was a study that said cloth was no better for the planet however if you look at the study the only sampled 32 cloth nappy parents and 2 responded verses 2000 disposable nappy parents. The average disposable nappy takes 500 years to decompose! Even with wash the carbon footprint of cloth nappies is very small and the more children they are used on the better.

What's in disposables?

This was our main concern disposable nappies are filled with chemicals to absorb moisture to keep little one dry. I just didn't fancy putting that on my most delicate baby's skin. Once you have used cloth a while if you change a disposable nappy you will notice the horrible chemical smell.

This article really sums up why we don't use Scary Sposies