[sbercus10]

Hi @atourgates - Shawn (Founder of Finnbin) here. Not all of our baby boxes cost $300+ - our most basic baby box starts at $65 (https://www.finnbin.com/products/babybox-boxinet).

To answer your comment & questions: The reason our most expensive box (The Finland Original) costs $450 is because it contains over $700 worth of stuff - at least on the shelf if you are purchasing each item individually. For a bit more insight, the bulk of that cost is the organic clothing that we include. Also, baby boxes have a lot of volume (or dimensional weight if you want to use the shipping jargon) so baby boxes are incredibly expensive to ship. Because most consumers would be shocked at the actual cost of shipping, we've factored shipping costs into the total cost of the box.

To answer your question about what the government pays for these: Finnbin does have contracts with hospitals, insurance companies, and government entities who typically purchase hundreds boxes at a time and often thousands - The average metro hospital does about 1,500 births per year. Like any other product, volume orders obviously get a price break and because baby boxes take up so much space, they also tend to receive the boxes on a pallet shipped flat - which can also lower their costs. Each government order is slightly different and thus there is no specific cost to a government entity, but they still pay in the hundreds of dollars if they are purchasing the baby box containing all of the goods.

Happy to provide additional insight if you'd like.

[atourgates]

That's great - glad someone is offering this. Any plans to offer Scotland's box?

[sbercus10]

Unfortunately, Finnbin is not the current supplier for Scotland's baby box program.

[atourgates]

Oh nice - that's a distinction I didn't understand. You're saying that your company actually supplies the boxes given away under Finland's program, and you make those same boxes available to consumers?

I was imagining you and your competitors would either obtain the boxes from the assembler/manufacturer directly or assemble close replicas. Not that you were the actual supplier.

[sbercus10]

Not exactly. Although we do supply healthcare organizations and government entities domestically and abroad, we are not the suppliers for Finland. The Finnish baby box program is conducted by Kela, a Finnish government agency in charge of settling benefits under national social security programs. Unfortunately, they took some heat earlier this year for their labor practices to make some of the products they include in their baby boxes (https://yle.fi/uutiset/osasto/news/finnwatch_majority_of_fin...).

From what I understand, the company Finnish Baby Box (based in Finland) uses the same products from the same suppliers and makes those same boxes available to consumer.

Finnbin, the company I founded, manufactures our own boxes and sources the materials for our box from US-based companies who utililze managed forestries and are certified to Sustainable Forestry Initiative (SFI) standards, created to promote responsible forest management.

And, although the original Finnish government program was the inspiration for our product, we've tailored our product offering to the American consumer and with American brands. For example, the Finnish baby box contains a regular sheet rather than a fitted sheet. This would not adhere to the American Academy of Pediatrics safe sleep recommendations. Therefore, we include a fitted sheet custom to the waterproof mattress we provide.

Additionally, much of the clothing in the Finnish government boxes program is designed for a much colder climate than we're used to here in the US. Rather than including similar products that many people wouldn't likely use, we've replaced them with more universal clothing and products.