Choosing formula

[Onceuponatimeinalandfaraway]

How did you decide which formula to use? There are so many brands all claiming to be the best so how do you pick one?

You pick the cheapest to begin and see how they get on. They’re all nutritionally similar, don’t fall for marketing.

Yep agree with PP

They are so tightly regulated that they are all very similar.

they are all nutriotionally formulated to adequately feed a baby.
maybe check what your corner shop stocks for those situations where you can't get to the big supermarket.

They are all as good as each other. The rest is pure marketing.

Start with the cheapest and easiest to get and go from there.

If you have Aldi or Lidl near you, use that, it's cheap, and has no added marketing. Everything stuff like aptimil etc has added is unproven benefit, because if it were proven, it would be included in what HAS to be in there. Go for the simplest and cheapest you can buy easily.

Kendamill are one of the worst for misleading marketing, imo. Don't buy their shit.

Mine had aptimil for first 6 months then sma and aptimil cos where i moved to had very few shops and mostly only had sma. They thrived on both

A tip I read is to go to your local corner shop, see what they stock there and chose one of those. It'll be cheaper in a big supermarket but at least you know you'll be able to get some if you get run out/get stuck without any.

thank you all :-) I usually shop in Lidl or aldi so relieved to know they’ll be fine.

Agree with PP to start with cheapest as they are so tightly regulated. However some babies get on better with different brands so you may have to switch if there are issues.

First milk can be used for the whole first year - you don’t need to switch to follow on milk - that was created so the companies could market it.

Agree with PP whatever you can get most easily when you run out!

Agree with all of the others. They are all so tightly regulated to make sure that your baby is adequately fed that you don't need to worry about which brand.

What you regally don't want is to choose one that you can only get online, especially with current delivery times, or is only available 20 miles away and you've got 3 foot of snow outside your front door.

We went with aptamil - not really sure why but in hindsight I guess it was because they did the starter packs with the sterilised tweets that you take into hospital - it was when there was that premix formula shortage and they were the only ones we could get hold of. We also had a lengthy hospital stay so went through quite a few of those packs. DS seemed to get on with the brand so we just stuck to it. But it's true it is just marketing and they're all very similar nutritionally. Good advice from above though starting with cheapest and go from there.

They’re all fine nutritionally. I would start with the Aldi one as it’s cheapest if you are near an Aldi. They do get used to the taste so once you’ve started it’s hard to change

They’re not all the same what so ever. Yes they all have to meet certain nutritional requirements but that doesn’t mean they’re all the same

the majority of formula contains Palm oil and if you actually read up on how horrific that is for our health then you’d see why some formulas don’t contain it.

They’re not all the same what so ever.

I think that when people say "they're all the same" what they mean is that they all have to adhere to strict nutritional standards.

But yes, you are right in that they do differ in how those standards are met some one will have different ingredients to another.

They are all in the same as in there is no 'best'.

They r so tightly regulated I started with the cheapest, Cow and gate and figured I could move to another if it didn’t work for us. Luckily it worked out well. Aldi is cheaper but I didn’t go for that as obvz it’s only sold there whereas cow and gate is sold in lots of shops !

Good advice here. Don't pick a niche brand whatever you do.

As pp said they all get to the same nutritional content but some have different ingredients to others. Most cheap formula contains palm oil which is disastrous to our planet (look it up). In addition to fish oil to meet the omega 3 content.
One pp said don't believe the hype but kendamil is the only British made formula with no palm or fish oil. This is fact, nor marketing.
It all depends on your budget / morals really, as pp have said they will all nuttionally meet the needs of your baby

Ah, the kendamill marketing bots are here. They're very aggressive.

You won't find Aldi pushing its perfectly good formula aggressively, or guilt tripping parents.

@thesnow

Indeed. Aldi formula is very reasonably priced, I’m only sad mine were grown up so I couldn’t use it, it would have saved me an awful lot. Best friend has fed her one year old twins on it very successfully.

As pp have said, the best advice we were given was by our NCT leader who told us to buy whatever is available near you at 2am or whatever. As it was, we ended up on Cow & Gate which is what the NICU had when i was at the depths of despair trying to get my breastfed NICU baby to gain enough weight to leave hospital. It was perfectly fine for us.

I love kendamil, it’s the only milk made from whole milk and it’s produced in the U.K. It’s easier to source now than it used to be but you can also get it direct from the on subscription, with no delivery charge. We tried a few with my first and it was the only formula to smell half decent too.

It’s £11 a tub so mid range but it’s 900g and lots are only 800g.

Aldi are discontinuing their own brand so you may have trouble with that.

For ease I would get something you can get a ready pour version of. I used ready pour for night feeds, holidays and journeys. We had no problem with aptamil.