Washables or Disposables

I have a daughter that is always telling me that the need for technological and social progress is overhyped. After all (says she) if someone doesn't know what they are missing, they can't miss it. Get it? Hence, cavemen without central A/C are well enough off. Nineteenth century men and women that only knew a 6 day work week of 12 hours per day could smile as easily as the rest of us. The deprived child that has never tasted ice cream laughs just as often as the child who has long lost his healthy diet innocence.

She and I go round and round with our discussion on this point. I'm pretty sure that progress is good, albeit complicated. Alas, my daughter is stuck in the past.

One thing I know--for sure--is that there are some experiences or products in life that change us, for the better. Something gets learned, and we never want to go back.

Washable care products are like that.

At EZwhelp we have learned over many years that customers that switch to washable pads or diapers typically never go back to disposables. With few exceptions, buyers that take the jump are committed and their disposables are then, disposed of.

There are several reasons that washable products are desirable. Experts have debated for years the environmental issues between washables and disposables. Perhaps I will occasionally blog about it. To be honest, the conclusion is not obvious so this discussion will likely continue for some time. Yet, environmental impact is definitely one consideration.

Perhaps a better reason to embrace cloth is that it is simply nicer. For thousands of years mankind has woven it and applied it to everything from clothing to a variety of utilitarian uses. Fabrics are intertwined with our history. Empires have been built on it...at least cotton, anyway. That fibrous plant and others and a multiplicity of synthetic fabrics in the modern world adorn our lives.

Fourteen years ago we were posting the picture below on eBay to promote our various underpad offerings. Yes, that's an underpad. By any standard the picture is now small and crude. But those 200x130 pixels ably captured the appeal of cloth. And cloth is washable!

Can you imagine this photo with the child clutching a disposable underpad? It would be weird. I am a man of the cloth, and I don't seek to rub my cheek on paper. By the way, I should add that this child is Emma--the same daughter that now challenges the virtue of progress. I say she can have all the paper disposable products in the world! No, wait. Um. Actually disposables are progress. I mean, they're modern aren't they?

Maybe Emma has a point.

—Boyd