Green Endings

Let’s face it. When a new mom is face to face with a full, warm diaper that needs a changin’, the last thing on her mind is her baby’s ecological footprint. (Or is it a buttprint?) An astounding four million diapers are thrown away every day in Canada. Thank goodness someone is worried about it. That someone is Vancouver’s own Karen Randall, mom entrepreneur and founder of New & Green Baby Co.

New & Green Baby Co. is both an on-line cloth diaper store and an invaluable, grassroots cloth diaper resource. For starters, New & Green carries a wide range of Canadian and North American, eco-responsible cloth diapers made from natural fibres like hemp and bamboo. Going cloth means that moms can feel good knowing that they have avoided exposing precious cheeks to some pretty scary chemicals, fragrances and toxins found in most disposable diapers. Best sellers, like the one-size-fits-all bumGenius and the brand-new AMP Duo Pocket Diaper, are offered by New & Green along with detailed product information written by a real mom who has tested the products on her family’s behinds.

Making the switch to cloth is a big and risky investment. We get that. That’s why we love New & Green’s Diaper Tester Program™. They know that sometimes you just need to see it, feel it and try it to decide if cloth diapering works for you. It’s simple. For $40, you can rent a diaper kit which has everything you’ll need to get started—from prefolds to pockets to all-in-one diapers and diaper accessories, like a bag for your dirty diapers, liners and inserts, cloth wipes, a Snappi to fasten your prefolds, and even laundry detergent. (Of course, everything in the kit has been super sanitized.) You will get detailed instructions too. Then, you’ll have two weeks to give it a shot. As if this wasn’t a good enough idea, New & Green also throws in a gift card when you return your tester kit to put towards your first purchase. Once you’ve made the decision to go green, new cloth diapering moms can take advantage of New & Green’s on-line gift registry to recruit help on the initial investment. Think eco-themed baby shower!

New & Green has a lot more going for it than just diapers. The lack of information about cloth diapering is what inspired Randall to start her business. Aside from the information packed website that she’s put together (we love the comparative cost fact sheet and eco info), Randall offers free Cloth Diaper 101 Workshops in the Greater Vancouver area. Karen and her diaper experts teach all the “how-to’s” of cloth diapering, help you nail down the real cost of a reusable system and give you a good look at New & Green’s product line. These small weekly workshops, open to a dozen newbies at a time, are held in neutral locations like local midwifery centres, baby stores and yoga centres, so there is no hard sell.

There are no butts about it. With each bottom producing over one ton of garbage from birth to potty, New & Green is saving the planet one diaper at a time.

Tagged under: reusable diapers,diapers,disposable diapers,green living,New & Green Baby Co.,cloth diaper workshops,Diaper Tester Program,gift registry,diaper accessories

Category: green-living