PackIt Or FridgeToGo Lunchboxes

You would be amazed how little it takes to keep your kids lunch cold. Heck I have used paper bags and a frozen capri sun.

Sorry, I have seen the commercials and they act like keeping things cool at school is an actual problem where it is not.

The only time it would ever be an issue is outside in the sun. Even on field trips most schools send a big cooler, or coolers, to put the lunch boxes in.

Save your money, but some cheap thermal lunch box at the stores.

I agree with Jo. I've seen those PackIt commercials, and $20 for a lunch container is ridiculous, if you ask me. Like Jo said, they are looking to 'solve' a problem that doesn't exist.

I pay less than $10 for my daughters' lunch bags, and their ice packs are still cold when I get home in the evening. Don't spend more money than you have to. Well, unless you want to. It's your money. :)

We have the Pack It, and it works wonderfully! I put the food in it around 6:30 am, and when I pick him up at 2 it is still cold.

We ordered online, and while the deal was BOGO, you had to pay a high shipping & handling charge. So, I'd buy it at a local store.

If you order online they do give some pretty cheap little containers as well, but they were really a low quality and not worth the total cost.

I got a PackIt last year for my daughter when she was in kindergarten. It was alright, but I would't buy one again. The velcro was in really bad shape well before the school year ended and would come apart really easily. We were able to make due until the end of school, but then it went in the trash.

The PackIt is also pretty heavy, which may not be important if you have older kids. Since my daughter is younger we put her lunch bag in her backpack or she would lose it. The weight of the PackIt plus whatever else she had to carry made her backpack extremely heavy some days.

This year my daughter is using a regular insulated lunchbag with two of the Rubbermaid Blue Ice packets and it stays much colder. We're in Florida and my daughter is in the afterschool program. I pack her lunch at 7:00 in the morning and a good portion of the Blue Ice is still frozen when we get home at 5:30 or 6:00 in the evening.

FYI - if you do get a PackIt, do NOT fold it up when you place it in the freezer. I found that if I layed it flat it worked better. There were times when I folded it and put it in the freezer and pulled it out the next morning and it wasn't frozen all the way. That only happened a few times when I forgot to put it in the freezer until later in the evening, around 10:00 or so. Anyway, if you lay it flat it freezes faster.

I'd go to the Salvation Army or Goodwill store and buy a very small, kid-sized ice chest. The put a frozen capri sun or frozen bottle of water and it will stay cold enough to last until he gets home with his food if he doesn't eat it a school.

Just a thought: I started school in 1955. I graduated from high school in 1968. I always took a brown bag lunch and never got sick or even ill because my lunch became too warm. I think you're are swallowing camels and straining at gnats. (I went to k to 8th in the desert southwest. Your weather is much cooler in MN.)

Don't worry about the temperature of the sandwiches and just give him a brown bag.

Good luck to you and yours.

From what I've seen, these are both clever marketing gimmicks & are no better than a traditional insulated lunch box. You can buy smaller ice packs or flexible ones that don't take up as much as the large ones do, if you're worried about space.

The lunches sit in a cool room until lunch time. Every day, DD's ice is still very cold & partially frozen, and we live in a hot climate. Did I mention that she also goes to before & after care? Don't waste your money.

On another note - we ate baloney & cheese sandwiches out of an ice-less lunch box and chocolate milk out of a Thermos in the 1980's & somehow we never got food poisoning.