Review of the Best Size 0 Nappies – Pampers vs ASDA

We have put to the test two brands of nappy from two of the top sellers of nappies. We will not persuade you into buying one brand over the other.  The idea is to give you enough knowledge so that you can determine which brand of nappy is best suited to your baby.

 

The testing has been compiled into a verity of different methods, testing which talks about both the positive and negative of each brand.  We have chosen Pampers Size 0 nappies and compared this with ASDA little angels size 0 nappies.  Both have their positive and negative features.  We have constructed a short video to show you both the brands in action, when they come into contact with wetness. The video can be found further down the page.

The Wetness Indicator

This is the line that runs from end to end straight down the centre of the nappy.  The line changes colour to blue, once the nappy is wet enough in which case the nappy will require changing.

  • Pampers – The wetness indicator on the nappy is a light yellow strip.  The colour is a much lighter yellow but the thickness of the line is slightly wider than the asda nappy.
  • ASDA  – The colour of the strip is a yellow colour, but appears to be more noticeable as the colour is much stronger.  The Line from end to end of the product is much longer, this could be because the nappy does not have a design on the front, therefor allow the wetness indicator to be slightly longer at the front of the nappy.

The wetness indicators on both products took awhile to react with the water, approx 3 – 5 minutes.  This could mean that once your baby has wet the nappy, the reaction time could be up to 5 mins until you notice that the nappy is wet.

Eventually after 5 or so minutes, both wetness indicators appeared to be blue, although pampers at first was a lighter blue than the asda nappy.  Over a small amount of time 10 mins, both indicators appeared to be a strong blue colour.  It did appear that the pampers nappy wetness indicator took less time to react to the water than the asda nappy did.  Asda nappy I think could be certainly improved in this area.

The Sticky tabs

These tabs are which hold the nappy together and stops the product from coming un done.  We have found the pampers nappy are made from half velcro which contain some stickiness on them.  When re fastening the pampers product, it does look like that some of the tab was left behind in the original place (after 2 – 3 re fastens).  As I replaced the tabs in a different location and did a test stress on the product by widening the waist multiple times.  it did appear that the tabs did firmly stay in place, after a certain amount of strain the tabs did give way.

We believe that the Pampers product did pass the test ok, giving that the baby will be not moving around much, but it does show that the Pampers nappy is a better product for expansion, especially as your baby grows so fast.  The asda nappy was very similar, although the widening of the asda nappy didn’t seem so much giving, therefor less room for mover-ability.  pampers did out perform asda in this test.

The tabs on the pampers nappy are part Velcro/sticky, where as the tabs on the asda nappy is sticky pads seem to with hold slightly more of a stretch.

The Overall experience in re fastening the product, if you do decide to check your baby’s nappy and your baby does appear to be wet.  If you have re fastened the tabs to check, I would advise to do a completely nappy change and change the product.  This is so that you do not find out that some minutes later the product has un done itself and potentially wetness or solid contents could go everywhere on your baby’s clothes.

The tabs on the pampers nappy is slightly bigger than the asda nappy.  This could have its advantages that a more secure product around the baby’s waist.

Tests when adding 200 ml Water to each product

When adding 200 ml to the asda nappy, the wetness indicator changed to a light blue.  The surface of the nappy after 2 or so minutes still seems to be slightly dam, compared to the pampers product. I placed a kitchen towel to the surface of the  pampers nappy revealing no wetness at all.  I did the same with the asda nappy and get some wetness showing.   I have to push very hard on the pampers nappy not to even come close to when pressing lightly on the asda nappy.  The pampers nappy is much more bulky, therefor it would be easier to spot when your baby need changing in a pampers nappy.

pampers nappy with 200 ml took approx 20 seconds to absorb, the product shows its held the wetness in quite well.  The tissue paper I used to check the surface of the nappy did show some wetness, after 3 mins of the product having wetness, the surface of the inside of the nappy appears to be quite dry, and the nappy itself seem to be quite stiff.  the Stiffness of the nappy has expanded to approx 4 times its original thickness.

I think that both products would find it difficult to hold more than 200ml each, despite several tests being carried out.  200 ml is the equivalent of approx 4 – 5 wee’s in the nappy from a premature baby, in time this is to be approx 1 – 2 hours of wetness.

Absorbency check after 5 mins of the 200 ml being added to the product, both nappy seems to be relatively good.  Although asda nappy when firmly pressed down does show some water seeking through the nappy onto the kitchen towel.  You do not get any water on the kitchen towel when you do the same to the pampers nappy.

The asda nappy after adding 200 ml seems to be slightly more mover ability within the nappy. Although took a bit longer to absorb the 200 ml which was quickly added to the product.   A pool of wetness took slightly longer to soak into the nappy compared to pampers nappy. When both products have been wet, there seem to be much less of a chemical smell in the asda nappy than the pampers nappy.  Bare in mind that I have only used water for this theory…

The weight test after 200 ml has been added to each product shows that the asda nappy is slightly lighter between the two.

Textures and Properties of each Nappy

The top layer of the insides of the asda nappy, is smooth but has no design pattern.  Although you can see the Small pad in the product that prevents wetness from reaching baby’s skin, the inside of the pampers nappy has a zig zag pattern made up from small tiny dots.  This design pattern seems to make the nappy slightly more rougher than the asda nappy.

The outside design on the pampers nappy has swishes and curls pattern, possibly from the machine that makes them.  The outside of the asda nappy has no design, which could be a reason as to how cheap the nappy is compared to the pampers nappy.  Also the outside of the pampers nappy seems to be much softer and a material based product, this will dampen the plastic sound of the nappy as the baby moves in the product.  Asda’s nappy on the outside actually feels like a nappy and looks simply flat, also slightly more of a rougher outer layer.

The Finishing cut of each nappy is some what different from each other.   The pampers product, front and back is cut like a big wave, where as the finishing front and rear edging of the asda nappy is cut straight.

Report and findings

The below table compares each nappy against each test we recorded.

# Checks Pampers Micro size 0 Nappy Asda size 0 Newborn
1 Cost of Nappy Pack £3.75 £2.50
2 Individual cost of Nappy £0.15p £0.10p
3 Quantity of nappies in pack 24 24
4 Baby weight (as shown on pack) 1-2.5kg 2 – 5lb 1-2.5kg 2 – 5lb
5 Design on front of nappy 3 Different Designs No Designs, Plain white
6 Colour of wetness indicator (dry) Yellow faint Yellow strong
7 Colour of wetness indicator (wet) Blue Blue
8 Weight of nappy (dry) 16g 16g
9 Weight of nappy (wet) 200ml added 192g 180g
10 Quickly locks away wetness 30 seconds 2 minutes
11 Stress testing 9/10 6/10
12 elasticated test on tabs/product durability 8/10 7/10
13 Re fastening product 6/10 6/10
14 Final result of wetness test 9/10 8/10

Elastic/netting on the inside

The elastic (netting) on the inside of the ASDA nappy  that holds both wetness and solids, appears to be folded over, but the finishing of the product is quite poor because the inside of the netting is just simply dangling on the inside.  The pampers product has a much neater finishing.  I can only assume that the difference being is that the asda nappy because of this design flaw, may not hold solids in the nappy as good as pampers.

Length

The length of each nappy is very identical, apart from the ASDA nappy being mm slightly longer.

Wear and Tear

A test was carried out to replicate the wear and tear of the baby in the nappy, this involved getting each product and rubbing both sides together and being rough will it.  The pampers nappy came out exceptionally well over the asda nappy.   The asda nappy looked like it changed its shape, where as the pampers nappy kept its shape.  This indicates that if the baby was to be active and very wet, then pampers would come out much better than asda nappy. Both nappies appear to be dry after this test although pampers came out slightly ahead than asda nappy in this test.

Looks over Performance

Pampers nappy does look a little more appealing with the designs on the front of the nappy.  Where as the asda nappy is just plain white.  Not too sure why on pampers you would want a design, I would assume it could be to keep inline with all the other pampers nappy brands.  Usually the design on the front of the nappy is for the benefit of the baby on larger nappies, thus keeping them occupied by showing the designs to the baby whilst during a nappy changing.  Pampers could easily do away with the design on the front of their nappy by just keeping a pampers logo on the front.  Or even reducing the cost of the nappy, or by changing the product to absorb even more wetness.

Stress Test

The stress test on both nappies showed no signs of any of the jell leaking around the edging of the nappy.  This I would think would be a very important factor as some larger products do tend to leak Jell.  The Jell that is within the nappy is super absorbent polymers which reports have indicated that nappy’s should be able to hold 30 times its own weight.  In fact the tests show that it can only hold approx 12 times its own weight (pending on size of nappy i assume).  The sodium polyacrylamide is used in the heart of the nappy, that is what’s used to quickly absorb the wetness away from the baby’s skin.  This sometimes results in leaking around the edges, but quite clearly these nappies do stand up to the stress test.

Plan ahead

the wetness speed check didn’t really go to plan.  Although pampers nappy seemed to perform slightly better.  The check consisted of putting each of the nappy over the same size glass, with exactly the same amount of water (200 ml).  At the same time turn both glasses over and wait until one of the nappies had absorbed all the water.  during this test i found that the pampers nappy increased its size and knocking the glass over, due to the nappy expanding 3 – 4 times its original size much more quicker than the asda nappy.  I think 200 ml quickly is unfair to judge asda nappy, I think next time i will try only three lots of 100 ml at a time, which should be about the correct amount of a new born baby actually doing his/her bowl movement. I left both nappies 10 mins, then got each nappy and squeezed each nappy thus trying to get out as much wetness from the nappy.  Both nappies did show signs of wetness which dripped out of the nappy.  asda nappy just slightly more wetness than pampers.  the difference being is that pampers nappy when fully wet, the product seems to turn hard, where as asda nappy doesn’t do that.  it could be because the inner core of the pampers nappy is much better designed.

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