My sister is fleecing my parents.

She’s currently pregnant with her first and is pram/buggy shopping. My parents are paying for it……..the one my sister wants for the second coming of christ/satan is to cost a grand.

Now I’m no expert, but i’ve done a google search and checked out a few examples and to be honest, I can’t find one that costs a grand without going to stupid extremes.

I’m sure its like boutique bikes versus off the shelf, but really, is there any need to pay a thousand pounds over one at £300

(disclaimer: I don’t really get on with my sister and this is just yet another in a long line of moments that make me grind my teeth, don’t even get me started on her husband)

Yip. Thats ripping the arse out of it right enough.

She’s currently pregnant with her first and is [insert everything] shopping.

Modified that for you.

First born, *everything* has to be the best possible. As soon as parents say something idiotic like ‘ooh, we’ll pay for that for you’, she’ll immediately latch onto it and go out and find the most perfect tool there is. It’s natural. For the second one she’ll accept second hand kit and by her 5th or 6th kid she’ll quite happily see them being pushed round in a cardboard box taped to a skateboard.

We bought a Jeep from Argos, when it needed replacing another one followed. Both are still used, we passed them on. Cheap, shaky so Miss Hairychested got her vibrations 😉 , sturdy enough to withstand Ryanair luggage handlers many a time.
A grand? Are your parents loaded?

No they’re not loaded, far from it.

Talking to sister on Facebook and she said thats including a car seat and ALL the accessories, although that may mean all the accessories in the entire store.

Been on a few websites to be nosey and I can’t find anything at all that comes in at that price.

Think when I have a kid i’ll ask for £1000 for a pram, buy a £300 one then **** off on holiday with the rest of the cash

Sounds like my brother and GF. Freeloaders…

FWIW, we had our first this time last year and my parents bought the buggy/car seat etc. Cost about £300ish and was Which best buy rated. Tell your parents to get onto Which (free/cheap trial for a month), and get the best rated one for your sister – guaranteed it’ll be less than a grand!

If your parents are stupid enough to pay the £1000 then they deserve to lose it!!
I can imagine what my parents (who could afford to spend that) would say if i quoted that much when they offered to buy one. And it isn’t printable here – they aren’t daft!

A thousand pounds for a pram???? 😯

Just fish one out of the canal; bit of bleach, it’ll be reet! 😀

it’d be pretty easy to spend £1000 on the whole pram/buggy/carseat/carrycot/cozytoes/accesories etc.

I spent £600 on our firsts buggy/carseat 9 years ago(and it was by no means the most expensive one in the shop, infact fairly average priced for the shop we bought from TBH.. It would have been a grand easily if I’d bought all the attachments/accessories available (for example. adding a set of rain covers for a complete travel system ie. buggy, cot & car seat can set you back £100)

it’s not really like a custom/boutique bike versus off the shelf at all, pretty much every pram/buggy is off-the shelf and if you’re comparing it with bikes a £300rrp complete travel system would be more like comparing a Specialized to a Halfords Apollo.

To be fair, like you said, you’re no expert. if you’d tried going into a decent pram shop rather than looking on google you’d have gotten a shock at what things cost, doesn’t even sound like you knew what you were looking for.

You are stirring it and misrepresenting here. Is it the pram that is a grand, or as mentioned above car seat, base, pram bit, forward facing bit, chassis, rain cover, cosytoes etc? Not top of the range to pay £1k for that, but not best VFM.

Like buying a bike then costing for helmet, lock, shorts, tops, jacket, Camelbak, glasses, pump, gloves etc.

Do you have a link to this fantastic bit of kit?

Ours cost £300 with all the bits and is still going after 3 years and 2 kids.

She’ll be wanting a bigger car next after she tries to get the cargo-ship sized pram in the back 🙂

How much did your bike cost? I’m guessing a lot more than the £150 that would buy you something ridable from Argos. Regardless of the right/wrong of getting your parents to spend £££ on it there is a huge spectrum of buggies and accessories that range from under £100 from Mothercare to scary amounts. I’m sure your sister would raise her eyebrows at the cash some people here throw at their bikes…

And, as mentioned above, what do you mean by accessories? Car seat systems alone can run to several hundred if you’re talking about isofix and adaptors for buggies

It’s easy to spend silly money on prams and car seats.
The chances are that the first one she buys won’t actually be what she needs and shell need to spend more on a replacement. I’d save your moaning for when your parents are paying for version 3.

Not that I’ve been through this or owt 😉

i got a fyll travel system off my grandparents when my 1st was born in 1999,
it was a britax, pram/buggy/car seat, cost £300 then.
in fairness, i used it for both of mine, then put it in a charity shop in perth, a woman got it and used it for 2 of hers.
i used to see her regularly round the town, (im a bus driver).
i dont think £1000 is really a lot, even though you can get cheaper ones, as GW says, like comparing an apollo with a midrange specialized.

we are bringing up baby on a slightly smaller budget..

we bought a full travel system with car seat and accessories that has not let us down once.. (and our boy is as bonnie and bouncing as they come.. he’s a BIG lad.. we’ll use it for his little brother or sister too )

a reputable make…. for… wait for it..

£150

sound sorted and sweet.. and it fits snugly in the boot of our punto.. anything more and you really are stepping into fashion victim territory surely?

EDIT: on the other hand though.. If we could have conned someone into getting us a boutique fashionista piece of beautifully designed nichecore statement in urban camo and brushed Ti.. then we would have jumped at the chance..

Come on grumpy, it’s sisters first born.
Hope uncly wuncly’s going to step up with a half decent cot

’tis true

For our first we bought a Mamas and Papa Ultima system which was

Modular Pram base
Lie down Pram & hood
Car Seat & Base
Forward / reverse sit up / lie down push chair
Rain cover
Muff *snigger*
etc.

All interchangeable etc.

Think it was just short of a grand. We thought we needed it, first baby get the best and all that.

Anyway, it was crap! on second baby and hardly used it. Car seat was re-used but it’s just too big and fiddly. You only use the pram bit for the first couple of months.

Can see how you can *think* you need to get it and have it. I suppose new parents won’t be told. You want what you perceive to be the best.

Sounds like this may be #1 Grandchild so Ma & Pa probably want to buy it also.

Look on the bright side, you’ll probably inherit it when your turn comes and it will be covered in extra snot and baby food.

and then you’ll just have to persuade your missus you don’t need a new one and your sisters old one second hand one is fine………

Good luck with that 😉

Having been married years ago and both of us having older kids when me and the missus had our son 11 years ago we found a really nice pram used for 80 quid it was mint as the lady who had bought it new didn’t like it.Get your sister to spend 300 quid and get your folks to buy you a new frame or some forks with the spare 700 quid? 😆

It’s easy to spend nigh on a grand on a pram when you add in car seat, foot muff etc etc etc – a bugaboo in john lewis is over £600 without footmuff, parasol blah blah b;ah – or there’s a special edition one for over £800, a Stokke inc car seay over £800.

as a note of interest, one of the ‘cool’ bmx pushchair brands uses own-brand proprietary size tyres and tubes. Available at special price for you only from their dealers.

Bobba fatt, know exactly how you feel, my dad was led to the cash machine the same way, and then every year he bought all the both kids school wear , not from asda or tesco, but high end shops, really annoyed me, oh and both parents where working in good jobs.

Also saw this,

Friday, November 5, 2010Buggy thefts worth £60m a year

A black market for stolen baby buggies has emerged and is worth around £60m a year, according to insurance estimates. Sales of top-range strollers are up more
BBC News ( 11/5/2010 8:29:09 PM -08:00 )

Stolen buggies ‘boost black market’
The fashion for expensive baby buggies is fuelling an increasing number of thefts and a thriving black market, it has been claimed. Thefts of strollers have more
The Press Association ( 11/5/2010 4:15:07 PM -08:00 )

Baby buggy black market “thriving” in Britain
LONDON (Reuters) – A black market worth an estimated 60 million pounds has sprung up around expensive baby buggies, Halifax Home Insurance more
Reuters UK ( 11/5/2010 4:07:55 PM -08:00 )

Leading article: Pram wars
It had to happen. After 4x4s and lightweight bikes, pushchairs – or rather buggies as we call them now – have entered the street thief’s list of desirables. more
Independent ( 11/5/2010 4:00:59 PM -08:00 )

Buggy burglars, scourge of yummy mummies
If you go down to the shops today, be careful where you park your buggy. Britain’s seemingly insatiable demand for designer pushchairs has more
Independent ( 11/5/2010 4:00:53 PM -08:00 )

Buggy bandits steal £60m of prams
THE trend for designer baby buggies costing hundreds of pounds is fuelling an increasing number of thefts and a thriving black market. more
Scotsman ( 11/5/2010 4:05:16 PM -08:00 )

Just went and got 1 from mama’s and papa’s the other week supposed to be £70 reduced to £425 thats included footmuff,parasol and the 3 in 1 travel system. i would never of paid £750 for it this is our first child but the limit was £500 anything other that is over the top imo.

Fools and their money are soon parted.

Our first pram was £150 or so. Argos are selling prams for less than that. Car seats used to be about £20 from Halfords.

It turns out that babies don’t actually care, and will survive quite happily in any old pram that’s not actually falling to pieces.

We bought a full travel system from Mothercare with the 1st baby, 5 years ago. £480. When it was no longer required I stashed it in my mum’s shed. When we came to need it with no.2 child imminent, I dug it out to find that the seatbelt for the car seat/carrier part had been chewed by a **** mouse!

Tried to find a replacement on Ebay and ended up buying the full travel system again, with more accessories than we originally had, in excellent condition for £45 quid. I’d never buy a new one again.

by her 5th or 6th kid she’ll quite happily see them being pushed round in a cardboard box taped to a skateboard

😆

? It’s easy to spend a grand on pram and car seat etc? We got a bugaboo and a car seat, was easily around that.

Be happy for your sister dude.

Don’t get involved. Yes your sister is taking them for a ride, yes 1000 is a massive price for a travel system, no it’s not justifiable in anything other than brand terms. You simply can’t win this one though. The worst bit is any parent onto number two or three knows that a car seat and a lightweight umbrella buggy is the sensible way to do it total cost 150 odd quid if that.

joolsburger – how many hours a day do you push a buggy?

+1 for joolsburger. We went down the small and foldable route and never regretted it. Top criteria is being able to fold said pushchair with one hand while holding the future of the universe in the other. Especially good for those who still take buses although being able to get shopping and pushchair into a car is also nice

My future wife is happy with the ebay/car boot sale/freecycle approach. My mum’s already offered to buy the pram, I’ll suggest something else that we couldn’t get on the cheap.

GW I run a buggy pushing business and I’m maxed out so around 10 hours a day currently.
🙄