Mandatory Nursery Bag - AIBU?

[RiverPumpkin]

DS?s nursery has given all the children a "special gift" of a school bag with the nursery's branding. Now it turns out they are "unable to accept" children using any other bags and there's a charge for replacement if lost. So, it's not really a gift is it? DS and peers are under two and I object to them being made to use branded/corporate identity. I expect a strict school uniform and community identity from which ever school DS goes to. But this isn't school. Am I being unreasonable?

What?! YABU to get het up about the nursery requiring you to use a branded bag (althou sounds like a nightmare with each child having an identical bag) because frankly who cares but the nursery ABU to insist that you use it and charge you to replace something given free as a 'gift'

LOL at "unable to accept" children using other bags - what are they going to do, reject the child at the door?

If it's to spot them on outings there may be some point to it, but I would feel a bit like my child was being employed as a walking advertisement.

Giving a branded bag to parents to use is not a bad marketing idea, but charging for replacing it, and insisting no other bag can be used is ridiculous, and I'd be staying up nights thinking of ways to piss them off while adhering to the letter of their "law".

E.g. put everything in a plastic bag before you put it in the nursery bag.

Take ONLY the plastic bag and contents home - leave the nursery bag for them to mind each night (mark it clearly with your child's name so that if it goes astray they can't blame you in any way).

If challenged, tell them you can't afford to replace it, and also that once you are off nursery premises they CANNOT dictate what bag you use. (and if they insist you use the nursery bag on the premises, bring it to the front door, take the plastic bag out of it, and hand the nursery bag back to the nearest employee).

If you ever have occasion to bring the nursery bag out of the building, make sure you have a much bigger empty bag to put it in, so that it can't be seen (i.e. fuck up their marketing strategy!). If you could get one for ANOTHER nursery that would be fantastic...

In the nurseries I've worked in that have done this, the sole reason is to get parents using bags that hang on the pegs in the cloakroom. Bags with long handles hang quite low and don't get in the way of the coats.
If it's for 'branding', it's a really wanky idea and you should annoy the nursery as much as possible. Get their logo tattooed on your neck.

blimey, I like the woman being spanked by a copy of womans weekly's ideas. How very twattish of them.

Isn't this standard nursery.practice, then? When dd joined nursery we were given a (branded) bag, which I have used ever since. They have never told me as such that I had to, but it is handy so why not? Likewise they have never said that if I lost it I'd have to replace it, but it is hard to see how that would happen anyway, as it only goes between nursery and home. Why provide your own bag and risk it being damaged/nicked/lost if the nursery one will do (for similar reasons i stuff our bag with dd's most rubbish clothing, tho to be fair our nursery are great and never lose anything).

All sorted, had a chat with the nursery manager this afternoon and she actually thought the letter was poorly worded herself and her staff certainly won't be mandating the use of these bags and she really had intended them as gifts in good faith. It seems like a classic case of a Head Office mandating something without listen to the staff on the ground which I think happens in many lines of business (like Starbucks mandating their staff to ask your name for the cup).
The nursery are in all other areas really very good but I'm glad i raised the question with them. Thanks for all your feedback.

Welcome to the world of twatish letters to parents, that no one has reread.

I'm afraid you have another 18+ years of them (even my university science registry wrote total nonsense on occasion)

The ability of educational establishments to produce note that confuse, annoy or simply make you LOL because they are unworkable, never fails to amaze me.