Baby Trend
Baby Trend, Baby Trend, what can we say? Hmmm, not much. They swore us to secrecy. BT doesn’t like to keep their customers waiting for their products, so we honestly can’t say much or they’ll peg us with really wet spitballs. They have some new fashions, for sure—very pretty. OK. Just be on the lookout for something new and old at the same time. But it’s revolutionary. There. That’s it. We really don’t want to be picking spitballs out of our hair.
Nuna
And then another little company came along and surprised us. Nuna is a Dutch company with lots of Euro styling. The PIPA (pronounced Pippa, like Pippa Middleton), was released in Europe last spring and they brought it to the show to make us drool. With rigid LATCH, a solid lockoff for seatbelt installs, and a load leg, the base installs easily and the infant seat is light (7.7 lbs.) with an aluminum handle that can be in any position in the vehicle. The release handle for the infant seat is on the base, which keeps that carrier nice and light. The canopy unzips to allow a thin SPF-rated “DreamDrape” cover to come all the way down to attach with magnets near the baby’s feet. Indicators on the base tell you when the seat is snapped onto the base. Keep in mind that the photos you see here are of the Euro carrier and the base is in early PROTOTYPE stage and will change. Expect to see PIPA by the end of next year. Let’s hope they keep the red—it’s simply to die for, dahling!
Combi
Combi is working on a Cocorro adapter for their new Catalyst stroller. It’s a pretty cool stroller. Oh, and we saw a red cover on the Cocorro!
They also had a Japanese seat there called the MGT. Sometimes they bring things like that over so maybe it’ll come, maybe not. But it went from 5-65 lbs. And it had the smallest egg crate foam under the bum area I’ve seen. Let’s call it parakeet egg crate foam and it was on top of EPS foam.
Clek
Seems we just can’t leave Clek alone. Sorry! They were able to get the Foonf rated to 50 FIFTY cinquante pounds REAR-FACING! Can’t seem to shout that any louder, lol. WOW! We know that just made your day. Another piece of news is that in some of the tweaks they made to the shell during finalizing the seat, they moved the crotch strap to keep it from interfering with the rf belt path. Here’s a picture showing measurements ’cause we know you also live for pictures.
SnoozeShade
Remember the SnoozeShade infant seat cover review I did back in June? They have a newer version coming out in March, just in time for next summer. It has a large pull-down flap for easier access to baby and a zip across the top still allows you to check quietly to see if baby is snoozing or awake.
Christineka – Unfortunately, no. They weren’t showing the seat this year at the show which leads me to believe that it either got scrapped or put on the back burner for now.
This would all be more exciting for me if you had news on some booster seats. Will the orbit booster be a reality sometime soon?
Jools – we discussed both of those issues extensively with the Baby Trend folks. The buckle isn’t going anywhere but they promised to go back and re-evaluate the handle position stance. I’ll provide details when I do the full BT write-up.
Dear Baby Trend: Let us leave the handle up, and GET RID OF THE PUZZLE BUCKLE. Seriously. That’s all the revolutionary anything I need out of you guys :p 😉
@crunchy, the foot prop should stay on the base. That’s pretty much a given at this point and shouldn’t change.
@Brandy, there’s no floor on the test bench, so there’s no way to test the foot prop. The base has to pass standards without it, so it’s considered an extra feature. Also, we do have pics of the MGT ;), but this was a quick get-it-out-there preview. Kecia’s going to write up more in-depth follow-ups on all the manufacturers we visited. We can’t do them justice in just a few sentences :D. Maybe some folks can [shrug].
Wha?? No Pic of the MGT? What is it about the foot prop that it does not test in in US standards?
BT- my guess is the latchloc with a spin.
Nuna- the DreamDrape sounds cool. Does prototype mean no foot prop here? And with all these Euro styling seats coming over, I expect some design changes from North American companies.