One of the most fun things to do is preparing your registry! This is something I recommend doing after you hear or see the baby’s heartbeat. Yes, that early!

Registries are a great way to start thinking about how you will parent. They can help you save money and if you do your homework, can be very time consuming!

It’s your job to figure out what product options will work for your lifestyle, read the reviews and ultimately choose a product for each need. Continue reading to learn how to master your registry and start a new life with baby without product regrets!

Understanding the Product Types

You may be thinking, how time consuming can it be? I’ll use a stroller to exemplify this, an item under the travel and transportation category. When I was building my registry, I learned there are different types of strollers: full-size, jogging, umbrella, double and travel system strollers that work with an accompanying car seat. I then had to determine what features in a stroller I was searching for. Some features include easy folding and storability, rear-facing, infant through toddler seating, and so on.

I then researched the “best” strollers and read a few different website’s top ten lists. I was shocked at the prices of the recommendations. “$1,200 for a stroller? How much is the average stroller?” Each recommendation sparked more thoughts to research.

I spent over 30 minutes reading, learning and thinking about strollers. That was just one item and I was going to spend even more time reading about strollers because…

Reading Reviews and filtering the B.S.

I thought I had narrowed down my stroller selection, until I started reading the reviews. Reading reviews for baby items is crucial, more so than other product purchases. Baby items are not always up to par with their description or ratings.

Crib mattresses is a big culprit of this. Many “infant” mattresses I saw were reviewed as too soft for infants but great for toddlers. Because the toddler parents reviewed these, the mattresses were given high ratings. That was not going to help me when I was buying this for an infant.

It’s not enough to go by the description or the ratings, you need to dig down and read the reviews. Also keep in mind, that with baby products, many people review the items before their baby arrives. They base it on appearance without actually using it. There are also people that use baby products for dolls and pets.

Here are two examples of bad reviews that affected a product having high ratings:

When I read reviews like those, I want to facepalm. Here’s how to effectively navigate reviews:

• Read several reviews from each level of rating and take in account the number of reviews for each rating.
  • If there are 500 positive reviews and one negative, the product is most likely good.
• Notate common pros and cons to find a trend.
  • If multiple reviews say the product had a horrible smell, you may want to look at purchasing a different product.
• Read the reviews for the same item on a different store website.
• Value the reviews where the user has used the product and take lightly those judging off of appearances.
• Take in consideration reviews provided as part of a promotion. These will be marked as such and tend to be more positive because the user did not have to purchase.

Use as a Shopping List

The goal for your baby registry is to have as many items purchased as possible, which is why you want to be prudent about what items you register for. Creating your registry early acts as a shopping list and allows time for you to find those items on sale or used. If you use the registry for this method, make sure to set it as private until you’re ready to share with friends and family.

Two items on my registry were an Ergobaby carrier ($150 + $35 for infant insert) and a bassinet ($200). I purchased the baby carrier in a different color with the infant insert for $50 from a local mother while browsing a Facebook flea market group. I disinfected and washed, and it was like new! I found a bassinet that I liked for $36 at TJ Maxx.

That’s almost $300 from two items that my family could apply to other high cost items on my registry. I could afford to spend the $86, but the $385 would have hurt my wallet if those items were not gifted to me.

Hot Tip: TJ Maxx, HomeGoods and Marshalls have amazing deals on baby products and carry brand names like Ubbi, Carters and Skip Hop.

You can easily reference your registry to see if a price is good or not. My mom called me while at TJ Maxx to say she found a changing pad for $12. I was able to pull up my registry and see that the same brand online was $20, so I told her to go ahead and buy it.

Time for Tweaking and Advice

Thanks to internet cookies, you will start seeing lots of baby product ads if you have not already! Anytime you see something you like, add it to your registry. It’s much easier and quicker than trying to search for that item later on.

If you do not know the gender and see a boy outfit you will absolutely want, add it. You’ll be able to quickly delete the boy items in a few clicks should you find out it’s a girl and vice versa.

Have one or two people you trust that are moms review your registry before sharing it with the world. I have so many friends tell me that they did not reach out for advice and ended up with products they never used.

Final Thoughts

Most registry websites allow you to keep your registry private until you’re ready to share it, so there’s no harm in creating yours early. Investing the time in product research, reading reviews and asking for advice will avoid having to purchase/replace items you should have registered for after the baby arrives, thus saving you money!