City Moms Biggest Baby Shower Ever Review
May 30, 2015 14:07:36 GMT -5
Post by Deleted on May 30, 2015 14:07:36 GMT -5
Hi Everyone, July '15er here. I wanted to share my recent experience with City Moms Biggest Baby Shower Ever event, should it be relevant to anyone else. Before I purchased my ticket I was wondering if it was a good value, but the reviews I found were all from press, and as there were separate press tickets, I wondered if they had a "better" experience than the average attendee to encourage positive reviews. So here is the "average Joe" review I was looking for.
For those unfamiliar, City Moms throws events in several cities throughout the year, and the event is essentially a very large baby gear expo. There was a wide variety of brands represented at all price points, though it did seem to skew towards the higher-end product lines. They had a variety of ticket prices, some quite expensive. I attended the NYC event last week, which I believe is their largest.
The ticket levels were as follows: (1) a bare-bones ticket with general admission to the expo, but no gift bag, (2) a ticket that included a gift bag, (3) a ticket that included a Beco baby carrier, a "bingo" game ticket, and a gift bag, and (4) a ticket that included a Britax car seat, travel system, Beco carrier, "bingo" ticket, and a gift bag. All levels had single and couple options, with the couple costing slightly more. I was torn between the gift bag ticket and ticket that included the baby carrier and bingo game, mostly because the press reviews had overwhelming support for the bingo prizes, which the website noted could be anything from bedding and bottles, to diaper pails, to strollers and bassinets. I decided that in the end, the carrier was worth at least $140 depending on which style Beco it included (it did not specify) and so it was worth taking a $50 gamble on the gift bag and bingo. I paid slightly more for the couples ticket, which just included my husband's admission and not any other goodies, so if you're ok meandering on your own, you could save some money by getting a single ticket and having your partner meet you at the door at the end of the night. I also signed up during "early" registration, which saved $20 or so.
I can say without hesitation it was worth every penny of the nearly $200 we paid for the ticket. The expo was great and we were introduced to a few products we hadn't yet heard of, and that would suit our needs very well. Many of the tables had small raffles, give-aways or samples in addition, which I didn't include on my "value" spreadsheet. Most of these were single-use samples of diaper creme, lotion, or detergent.
The gift bag was a tremendous value - including the value of my carrier it was over $500 of products, without the carrier (should anyone be considering the base "gift bag only" ticket in the future) the value was still over $350. I pulled the value of products from Target.com, Amazon.com, BabiesRUs.com, and similar retailers and used the pre-tax value - as NYC tax is 8.875%, our "actual" value was even better, but as tax rates vary, I wanted to use pre-tax values for this review. Not every product will be relevant to every family, but there was definitely enough there in which we were interested and will use that I felt we got our money's worth with items we will definitely use - particularly the items like diapers, wipes, bottles, sippy cups.
I happened to get particularly lucky with the bingo prize and won an umbrella stroller we had admired on the floor of the expo - the Quinny Yezz - which added significantly to our total value breakdown as it's valued at $279. A colleague attended and she won a bottle set that she happened to have on her registry - significantly lower monetary value ($25-$100 depending on the brand/set), but still a good prize.
Here is the breakdown of what was in the goodie bags. I'm having trouble adding pictures but will try to add as well when I can figure out why they're too large.
For those unfamiliar, City Moms throws events in several cities throughout the year, and the event is essentially a very large baby gear expo. There was a wide variety of brands represented at all price points, though it did seem to skew towards the higher-end product lines. They had a variety of ticket prices, some quite expensive. I attended the NYC event last week, which I believe is their largest.
The ticket levels were as follows: (1) a bare-bones ticket with general admission to the expo, but no gift bag, (2) a ticket that included a gift bag, (3) a ticket that included a Beco baby carrier, a "bingo" game ticket, and a gift bag, and (4) a ticket that included a Britax car seat, travel system, Beco carrier, "bingo" ticket, and a gift bag. All levels had single and couple options, with the couple costing slightly more. I was torn between the gift bag ticket and ticket that included the baby carrier and bingo game, mostly because the press reviews had overwhelming support for the bingo prizes, which the website noted could be anything from bedding and bottles, to diaper pails, to strollers and bassinets. I decided that in the end, the carrier was worth at least $140 depending on which style Beco it included (it did not specify) and so it was worth taking a $50 gamble on the gift bag and bingo. I paid slightly more for the couples ticket, which just included my husband's admission and not any other goodies, so if you're ok meandering on your own, you could save some money by getting a single ticket and having your partner meet you at the door at the end of the night. I also signed up during "early" registration, which saved $20 or so.
I can say without hesitation it was worth every penny of the nearly $200 we paid for the ticket. The expo was great and we were introduced to a few products we hadn't yet heard of, and that would suit our needs very well. Many of the tables had small raffles, give-aways or samples in addition, which I didn't include on my "value" spreadsheet. Most of these were single-use samples of diaper creme, lotion, or detergent.
The gift bag was a tremendous value - including the value of my carrier it was over $500 of products, without the carrier (should anyone be considering the base "gift bag only" ticket in the future) the value was still over $350. I pulled the value of products from Target.com, Amazon.com, BabiesRUs.com, and similar retailers and used the pre-tax value - as NYC tax is 8.875%, our "actual" value was even better, but as tax rates vary, I wanted to use pre-tax values for this review. Not every product will be relevant to every family, but there was definitely enough there in which we were interested and will use that I felt we got our money's worth with items we will definitely use - particularly the items like diapers, wipes, bottles, sippy cups.
I happened to get particularly lucky with the bingo prize and won an umbrella stroller we had admired on the floor of the expo - the Quinny Yezz - which added significantly to our total value breakdown as it's valued at $279. A colleague attended and she won a bottle set that she happened to have on her registry - significantly lower monetary value ($25-$100 depending on the brand/set), but still a good prize.
Here is the breakdown of what was in the goodie bags. I'm having trouble adding pictures but will try to add as well when I can figure out why they're too large.