Advice on buying a crib

[chet everett]

Originally Posted by Lookout Kid

I don't know why Ikea even bothers to sell hotdogs in Chicago. There's a Portillo's just up the street on Golf Road, afterall.

Their prices for lighting (from fixtures to led bulbs) are about as low as any. They recycle old CFLs too.

For RTA furniture, which admittedly is NOT for everybody, they certainly seem to have hit the right mix of consistent quality control, affordability, and good buying / building experience.

I'm a big fan of the ligonberry juice, and the little shrimp open faced sandwich / salad is pretty low priced light lunch.

Soft serve for $1 is a fairly good deal too, not as crowded as McDonalds.

[Lookout Kid]

Originally Posted by sukwoo

Holy crap! We checked out the Land of Nod and its very $$$$$$!!!

If you want to see even worse insanity, check out the boutique "Grow Baby" on Division Street in the Ukranian Village. But man is that stuff cool! As an architect/design junkie, the prices just kill me.

[Lookout Kid]

Originally Posted by chet everett

Their prices for lighting (from fixtures to led bulbs) are about as low as any. They recycle old CFLs too.

For RTA furniture, which admittedly is NOT for everybody, they certainly seem to have hit the right mix of consistent quality control, affordability, and good buying / building experience.

I'm a big fan of the ligonberry juice, and the little shrimp open faced sandwich / salad is pretty low priced light lunch.

Soft serve for $1 is a fairly good deal too, not as crowded as McDonalds.

When I was right out of school as an entry-level worker with modern furniture taste, I filled my apartment with Ikea stuff because of the prices. My wife and I have been slowly replacing the Ikea stuff over the years with modern furniture from DWR and Room & Board. But now with the economy tanking and architecture work drying up, we may be back in the Ikea price bracket again for a while... Sigh. I'm just happy to get by each month right now...

We've never seen the sense in spending money on baby items (with the exception of food). It just goes by so quickly. We were luck if our daughter wore an outfit two or three times through some of those growth spurts.

[oakparkdude]

Originally Posted by Lookout Kid

When I was right out of school as an entry-level worker with modern furniture taste, I filled my apartment with Ikea stuff because of the prices. My wife and I have been slowly replacing the Ikea stuff over the years with modern furniture from DWR and Room & Board. But now with the economy tanking and architecture work drying up, we may be back in the Ikea price bracket again for a while... Sigh. I'm just happy to get by each month right now...

We've never seen the sense in spending money on baby items (with the exception of food). It just goes by so quickly. We were luck if our daughter wore an outfit two or three times through some of those growth spurts.

We bought a ton of stuff through craiglist. A lot of people in OP had second-hand clothes, toys, etc. We could afford to buy all new stuff, but I just couldn't psychologically deal with paying full prices for stuff we'd use for a month or so only.

[Lookout Kid]

Our daughter was the fourth female grandchild, so we've got a ton of second-hand stuff. Our circle of friends keeps passing around the same super deluxe baby swing that someone got as a gift (who wants to store that thing in the city?!?). We were happy to get that out of our condo, so the second-hand thing can work out quite well for city folk. You just keep passing the stuff on to the next baby.

But for car seats and cribs, I say "buy new!". We won't mess around with safety and education.

[Mamama Mia]

Originally Posted by mr aztec

After extensive list on craigslist, IMHO cribs have horrible resale value--40% if you are lucky, 25% average. I did buy a crib on CL a couple of months ago to suprise my wife...she was not happy. lol. It is going to Brown Elephant today.

Thanks all for the advice. I will probably settle on Babies R Us, though I could make my bi-annual trip to IKEA and check out those as well.

As an aside, I'm not sure why I go to IKEA 2x a year, I always come back dissapointed and with something I really don't know what to do with when I get home. Its certainly not for their hotdogs!

So much in resale depends on the brand name.
As for Ikea, it's the Swedish meatballs and ligonberries you need to try.

[rossdaniela5]

You will get lots of companies selling baby cribs in the market. But I think you should buy it from well known websites/brands. Try to find out product reviews and consumer opinions before buying a product.

[Los Guys]

I don't mean to intentionally extend the life of this six-month thread old thread, but here's my experience. We didn't have any way to transport a crib to our crib, so we ordered it online. The upsides were free shipping, no tax, and the delivery guys offered to set it up. The downside was the two week wait, but we survived with a pack-n-play.