Reviews
Chewy
Experience
I use Chewy's autoship feature for food and meds for my dog and two cats. Their pricing is competitive and shipping is fast. The website works well and it's easy to find what I need. The best part is that they mail birthday cards to each of my pets every year. It's going to mean so much to them when they finally learn to read.
Dr. Bronner's
Experience
Dr. Bronner's promotes being the one stop shop for all your cleaning needs (plus some moral ABC and all-one or none stuff). There are 18 uses listed on their website: Massage Oil Acne Fighter Mouthwash Toothpaste Anti-frizz Serum Shower Reading Pet Shampoo Makeup Brush Cleaner On-the-go Cleaner Car Wash House Cleaning Shaving Deodorant Allergy Free Soap Hand Sanitizer Shampoo Soul Cleaner Delicate Clothes Detergent Did you notice they slipped soul cleaner in there? I think it's really only good as a body wash. Decent as a shampoo if you're cool with a deep clean. Really not advisable as toothpaste. It's great for when your'e traveling light. I did a bike tour a few years ago and only carried one little bottle of Dr. Bronner's peppermint and it lasted a whole month. It's affordable, smells great, and the company seems to genuinely care to do well by other people and the planet.
notNeutral
Experience
Everything from notNeutral is so beautifully designed. Their Lino series is sort of the essential third-wave coffee ceramics set. Everything I've had from notNeutral has been durable and the quality is consistent. Their custom printed products hold up really well to wash and wear, too.
Herr's
Experience
I grew up on Herr's potato chips. They were sort of the standard cheap lunch room snack brand for me. Broadly as a brand, they are Just Fine. However, their Cheese Curls go absolutely crazy. After decades of monotonous chip and pretzel production, they let the flavor lab staff go buck wild on these. If you gave a 17th century pilgrim a single Jalapeno Popper flavored cheese curl, they would drop dead. The flavor is that strong. It's like eating a Dorito for the first time. I hope they're just scraping the surface of cheese puff innovation. FFUPS and others should take note. P.S. Their Old Bay chips are an S-Tier chip as well.
Scrub Daddy
Experience
I think it's so cool that a guy invented a highly effective engineered polymer foam scrubber and named it "Scrub Daddy." The basic idea is that the sponge is stiff and abrasive when cold and soft when hot. The basic-er idea is that it's a sponge that looks like a face and is called Scrub Daddy. (Or Scrub Mommy. We have both scrub parents at my house.) I actually never use Scrub Daddy cold. When I wash dishes, I'm committed to maximum heat at all time. In the skin-melting method, the Scrub Daddy is very effective. An extra perk is that it doesn't get gross and stinky like regular sponges. After a while, Scrub Daddy does look worse for the wear and its time to let him retire. Every time I toss a Scrub Daddy in the trash, I do feel a bit sad. He's still smiling, though.
Actual Source
Experience
Actual Source is my gold standard for a product + service design company. They're a functional design studio behind the design of brands like Joggy and Necessaire, plus those A24 coffee table books that feel so ubiquitous now. As a product company, they create and curate a great selection of art and design books. They also make goodies with their own brand on them. Actual Source is sort of instant graphic design street cred.
Boot Boyz Biz
Experience
Boot Boyz Biz does monthly drops (usually the third Thursday at 3PM CT). Everything sells out in a few minutes. There's always a few tees, sweatshirts, and hats, but usually drops will have wild card items like ping pong balls, blankets, chairs, or drinking glasses too. Each item's design is a mash up of ideas and graphics from art/philosophy/pop culture, etc. Every item is accompanied by a graduate level essay detailing where the graphics came from and what they mean. I get such a silly little dopamine rush from their products. If I recognize just a single concept from one of the pieces, it's an instant buy. Aside from looking cool, they've introduced me to a lot of new ideas I might not have known about otherwise. Items are also reasonably priced for being so limited.
Alec's Ice Cream
Experience
Alec's Ice Cream is really really good. I've been a Jeni's ride or die for years now and Alec's blueberry honey lavender flavor had me questioning my allegiances.
Feedback
The brand positions itself on being regenerative organic and using A2 dairy (dairy made by cows with a special gene that makes their milk give less tummy aches??). I think that's very nice, but I'm used to these kinds of claims compensating for the flavor being worse. The flavor is better though! Alec's is an S-tier ice cream. It kind of seems like they're doing so many things well that it might draw attention from the most important thing: that the ice cream absolutely slaps.
Body Restore
Experience
My wife and I got a variety pack of these as a gift and were surprised at how much we enjoyed them. They really do upgrade the shower experience and last a long time. My wife and I can both take showers and have a single puck last the whole time.
Feedback
There is a bag for the set, and individual bags for each shower bomb, which seems like a lot of excess packaging.
YOWIE
Experience
YOWIE has a great collection of brands and products. Shannon, the owner, has incredible taste and I often check YOWIE as a reference for what's up and coming. I love what they're building in Philly.