Keith Lindner is a devoted dad, doting husband, tech nerd, a research expert and a certified Infant Feeding Technician. With 10+ years of consumer research and product management experience, he became passionate about finding and building products that improve his family's life and fit their lifestyle preferences. He loves sharing this info with other parents to help make life a bit easier during those first few years of life.
Latest posts by Keith Lindner (see all)
- How to choose baby formula - September 4, 2023
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At The Baby Swag, we are dedicated to educating and supporting families throughout their feeding journey – no matter what that looks like. We have been a trusted resource since 2018 to parents all over the world and take a lot of pride in that.
During this time we’ve talked to many parents, health experts, parenting experts, and directly with the brands we are researching. That has led to us naturally forming some beliefs on the feeding industry as a whole.
And we felt like it was important to share our beliefs with you because formula is one of the many things in parenting that has started to become a bit tribal (thanks social media) and we don’t think this is healthy for anyone.
- We believe that having a happy and healthy baby is the most important thing that all parents should be able to agree with. What is right for one family isn’t going to necessarily be right for the next family but as long as every child is getting the proper nutrition, we feel like that’s something worth celebrating, not fighting over.
- We believe breastfeeding provides the optimal nutrition for infants but understand that breastfeeding isn’t going to work for everyone. This could be by choice or necessity. It doesn’t matter to us. We want to support families to find the best solution for their situation whether that is exclusively breastfeeding, exclusively formula feeding or combo feeding.
- We believe breastfeeding is not the sole responsibility of women, but society’s collective responsibility. It should be protected, promoted and supported by governments, businesses and the healthcare system. We love to see companies like Bobbie fighting for families in Washington D.C.
- We believe more competition and more robust supply chain management is required in the formula space to continue to support parents and babies with the best and safest nutrition possible. We hope that the public and private sectors can work together to ensure the formula crisis from mid 2022 never happens again.
- We believe the FDA guidelines are safe but are outdated. They haven’t been updated since 1981. We hope the FDA will follow the European Commission and update the guidelines to include more recent scientific evidence.
- We believe it’s best for every parent to understand baby formula before their baby is born, even if they are planning on exclusively breastfeeding. Breastfeeding is unpredictable and it’s better to know what to do if/when you need or want to supplement with formula. Doing this when your 5 week old baby is hungry is not the best time to figure it all out. It’s better to have this knowledge and not need it, than to not have it and then not know where to find it.
- We believe formula vs breastfeeding vs combo feeding is one of the first opportunities for parents to start to get comfortable and confident in understanding what is best for their family. Parenting is nonstop decision making, some big some small but almost all are judged in some way or another. And finding your confidence early on when you make a decision that is best for your family vs your best friends or your neighbors will only benefit you as your baby grows.
- We believe that parents should aim to provide their baby with the best formula they can safely afford. With some of the new formulas coming to market there is going to be a big push to get parents onto these more organic, grass fed, etc. formulas but they are significantly more expensive than other options. And if you’re putting your family into significant financial and/or emotional stress to be able to afford one of these more expensive formulas (unless medically necessary), then it’s probably not worth it as those other stresses can negatively impact your family in a lot of other ways.
- We believe that more competition is needed in the industry and are thrilled to see companies like Bobbie and ByHeart enter the US market with such radically different approaches than the big incumbents. We should be aiming to provide the absolute best that science can offer to babies that aren’t getting breastmilk and we hope that this new wave of innovation continues.
- We believe that all infant formula ingredients and recipes should be available to the public. The newer brands like Bobbie and ByHeart are doing this but many of the big formula companies make it really hard to find.
- We believe it’s ok to do a bit of trial and error when it comes to finding the best formula blend for your baby’s needs. Treating your baby as a science experiment sounds a bit weird but this is what it takes sometimes. And this is also why we always recommend that healthy, full term babies start on a fairly simple formula and then you build your way up to some of the more fancy formulas if that is something you want to do.
- We believe the amount you spend on formula has zero impact on your parenting. Expensive formulas are expensive because they add in lots of ‘sexy extras’ and/or because their ingredients are from more organic sources… which cost more. It’s as simple as that. Which is a shame because it would be great if all formulas could have all the extra benefits, but rest assured, every formula has the nutrition your baby needs and that’s all that matters.
As a team, we pride ourselves in our research, diving deep into what’s happening in the formula world and doing our small part to help educate parents to demand nothing but the best for our babies.
Let us know your thoughts, feelings or questions below. We’d love to hear from you.
We hope your and your baby are kicking a** at whatever type of feeding journey you’re on.
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