ReSqueeze Reusable Food Pouch 6 oz. (8-Pack)

My children love those tubes and pouches of apple sauce and yogurt that are available at most supermarkets. I was looking for a cost effective and healthy alternative. These pouches more than met my expectations. They were easy to fill from the bottom and the closure holds securely. My children squeeze these pretty hard and I've never had any leaks. They've also been easy to clean.Initially, I thought the price was a bit high, but these pouches have paid for themselves quickly this summer. At my local market, applesauce pouches come in a 4 oz.-4 pack for about $3.00. My seven year old twins want 2 each per sitting for a snack. They enjoy whats inside, but also like the novelty of the tube. Now, I take these reusables and fill them with unsweetened applesauce, yogurt, or smoothies. If the kids want more, I just add a bit more from the fridge. A single jar of applesauce or yogurt can refill these more than a dozen times. I often place these in the freezer and allow them to thaw in the car while we play at the playground. The kids have a nice, cold snack without having to go to a convenience store.The only small drawback is that these containers don't really hold 6 oz. of liquid. When filling these, you have to stop at about 70% capacity or the bottom will not close. Liquid will spill out of the closure and make a mess. In an effort to be thorough, I measured liquid with a measuring cup and confirmed this. If your child is a hearty eater you may want to consider the larger size from this company.These have held up well through washing, refills and freezing, but I haven't tried the dishwasher for fear of losing the caps.

Overall, these pouches are great. I haven't tried any other brands of reusable pouches, so can't compare them, but I did do significant 'research' of Amazon reviews before settling on these from ReSqueeze.We are currently using them for a toddler's travel snacks (applesauce, smoothies, yogurt) but hope they last long enough to use next year with our second child, who is due in November 2014 and won't be on purees for over a year from purchase date. I hope to be able to do an update on durability at that time.Pros:- Shaped like the traditional pouches from the store. My daughter is used to those and I didn't really see the benefit of the side spout.- Easy to fill through the bottom 'zip lock' style opening- Great size for a toddler, in both packaging and amount of food it holds.- Cute design- Traditional sized lid, so if we lose one, we can use a replacement from a store bought pouchCons: (we consider these minor and easy to overcome...like I said, we like these pouches quite a bit)- Can be difficult to clean toward the spout. We have a bottle brush and a smaller brush for reusable straws. Together these seem to do the trick and hand washing seems to get the best clean. The only time that gave us difficulty was after a blueberry smoothie...the blueberry skin got trapped around the spout and took several washings to fully remove.- The opening on the bottom is sometimes hard to open, especially if the pouch is wet at all. I see this as a pro and con...if sealed properly, my daughter could not accidentally open the zip lock and pour out the contents. On the flip side, an adult may also have to put some 'muscle' into opening it. =)- It takes a few times to get used to how much you can fill them. I've found that, when the pouch is open from the bottom, I can fill about half way and still seal them without it oozing out over the top. Still plenty of food inside, but it there were a few times the first 2-3 days that I was washing yogurt or applesauce off my hands after overfilling.I would recommend these to anyone who feels that purchasing the 4oz pouches at the store is both a waste of money and produces too much trash. Using large containers of applesauce & yogurt and fruit that we already have at the house, these pouches quickly pay for themselves.

I did a lot of research on reusable pouches when my daughter was much younger since we made most of her food and hated the idea of using disposable pouches. The original version of these pouches were absolutely amazing. We got 6 of them (if I remember) and they lasted more than a year. If it wasn't for my daughter's school accidentally throwing several of them away, we'd still be using them. But because I loved them so much and we were down several pouches, we decided to keep the support for ReSqueeze and buy some more. The only thing is that these have been nothing but a disappointment.The absolute deciding factor for us originally purchasing the original version of these was that they advertised they were made in California. Apparently that wasn't sustainable because these are now made in China. Ok, so if I get over the fact that nearly everything we buy is made from China, I'd still not recommend these because of the small opening. I had never had any issues with leakage or sealing with the originals, so I'm not sure why the "improvement." The opening used to be nearly to the edge on both sides. I could easily scoop contents in without needing a funnel or getting messy. These new guys have such a small opening that it's really difficult getting anything in, even with a small spoon.Unless they start making these like the originals AND making them once again in the USA, I'd suggest looking elsewhere.UPDATED - 2015-11-23Because of the preview review above, ReSqueeze LLC sent me some new pouches with the wider mouth, but they're still nothing compared with the originals. The opening is almost back to the original width, but:• The opening still isn't as wide as the originals• The zippers are almost impossible to zip up and unzip• The lip on the bottom before the zipper is much smaller than the original - not helping the ability to open the impossible-to-open zipper• MOST IMPORTANTLY - liquid now gets trapped behind the zipper. I didn't notice this at first, but upon closer inspection tonight, it's not an isolated event. The two newer-style ones I was washing both had yogurt and water trapped underneath the zipper (pics attached). I can't clean these now, so I can't, with a good conscience, give them to my daughter.I really, really, really wanted this to work. I loved the concept and how they originally were made in California, but now that they've shipped production overseas, the quality has greatly declined. I wouldn't recommend these to anybody.ReSqueeze LLC, if you're ever able to bring production back to the US and have the original, quality-assured, design, even if they're 3x's as much as they were originally, please let me know and I'll buy several packs and spread the word to everyone who would listen to buy them also.