Darlings Downunder Blog

We know you love the Pop-In nappies from Close (formerly Close Parent). Well, do we have a deal for you!
For the whole of July and August, purchase 2 Pop-In Original (Bamboo) nappies or 2 Pop-In Dream Dri nappies, and you will get 1 FREE!

This promotion is for nappies only - unfortunately the fabulous carriers and extra insert sets are not included!
While we'll try and provide your choice of colour for your freebie, we can't guarantee stock levels - but we'll do our best.


To be kept up to date with contests, giveaways and nappy related information on our blog, become a blog subscriber or pop your email address in the 'Get Notified' box (in sidebar under the calendar) and you'll be emailed when a new blog is posted.

In 2009, two young Kenyan men - brothers, Moffat and Fred (a doctor) - began with a dream, minimal resources, and the financial backing of friends, family, and their own savings and opened a small medical clinic, the FreMo Medical Centre, in the heart of the Kawangare slum in Nairobi, Kenya. It is the third largest slum in the world and many people are displaced persons or refugees. Maternal and neonatal mortality and morbidity are high. 

Last year, Queenslander Natarsha Jazepczyk spent 5 months volunteering at the FreMo Medical Centre and returned to Australia inspired by the passion and dedication of its founders and determined to return to assist their growth. She was interviewed by the local paper. That local paper was read by a midwife, Vicki Chan. Vicki is the mother of four, a midwife, and a teacher of midwives. She volunteered to help in the creation of a safe place for women to seek pregnancy, birth, and post-partum care at FreMo Medical Centre.

Vicki and Natarsha are currently in Kenya assisting in the creation of the Birth Centre. You can read their blogs for an insight into the day to day operation of the FreMo Medical Centre: Vicki's Blog; Natarsha's Blog. There's a Facebook page for the FreMo Medical Centre too.

As part of the project, Emma-Leigh Barry is collecting and making up Mum & Bub Packs for the FreMo Medical Centre with the aim to provide basic essentials for mothers and their newborns. This is where you come in!

Emma-Leigh really needs cloth nappies for the Packs (but if you can assist with any other items on the list, I'm sure they'd be appreciated too!) and is hoping to send a shipment over in August, so if you are able to spare any nappies, please send them to Emma-Leigh Barry at 19 Lake MacDonald Drive, Cooroy Qld 4563 . Thanks, everyone!

To be kept up to date with contests, giveaways and nappy related information on our blog, become a blog subscriber or pop your email address in the 'Get Notified' box (in sidebar under the calendar) and you'll be emailed when a new blog is posted.

And the two winners of a Mother-ease Wizard Onesize EasyStuff nappy are:

...the poetical Christine and first-time mum Deborah!

Congratulations to Christine & Deborah!

And here's Christine's poem:

 This would work in my stash just great
 It's a great design, not one of the styles I hate
 I'm a big fan of collecting brightly coloured fluff
 So I'd really like to win the Wizard Onesize EasyStuff
 See that sunflower yellow, the colour of sunshine?
 It's my fave colour, but damn! it's so hard to find!

Email us with your addresses and we'll get a nappy off to each of you ASAP!

You may have heard that Darlings Downunder is a finalist in the 2011 AusMumpreneur Awards. Actually, we’re a finalist in two categories – Best Boutique/Store and the Customer Service Award. And we're really excited!


The winners of both these categories are decided by People’s Choice, which means that if we win either of these categories, it’s because you voted for us.

If you’re a fan of Darlings Downunder, and you think we deserve to win either (or both!) of these categories, please take the time to vote.

Unfortunately voting isn’t entirely straightforward. Connect2Mums, the online community for mums which runs the AusMumpreneur Awards, wants only genuine votes cast and so requires everyone voting to register. We understand that this might be annoying, but you can deregister once the Awards are announced on 28 August. It’s actually a really good site, so you may decide to stay registered!

To register you need to go to this page and sign up to the site. It shouldn’t take too long for your registration to be approved.

Then go back and jump to either (or, again, both!) of the links below which will take you directly to our voting pages. To vote you need to click the ‘Like’ button down the bottom – the one with the pink star. You can only vote once – clicking ‘Like’ again will remove your vote (and please don't try to log in under more than one email address to vote multiple times - or all your votes will be deleted).

To vote for Darlings Downunder for Best Boutique/Store click here
To vote for Darlings Downunder for Customer Service click here

You can win too!
By voting in the AusMumpreneur Awards you are eligible to enter the AusMumpreneur Competition to win one of three prize packs. After you've voted, visit here to enter.

If you decide to vote for us, thank you very much - we really appreciate you taking the time to do so. Wish us luck!

To be kept up to date with contests, giveaways and nappy related information on our blog, become a blog subscriber or pop your email address in the 'Get Notified' box (in sidebar under the calendar) and you'll be emailed when a new blog is posted.

Would you like to win a $40 Darlings Downunder voucher? To spend on anything in store?


It’s easy – just email us, letting us know what brand or product you’d like to see us stock and why (a personal recommendation is always great!) and you could be in the running to win a $40 Darlings Downunder voucher!
 
We’ll be announcing the winner in our next newsletter which is due out 1 August. If you're not a subscriber to our newsletter, you can sign up here.
 
We cannot promise that we will end up stocking your recommendation/s – but we always take our customers’ opinions very seriously. We’ve got some very interesting new products already under consideration, so stay tuned…
 
Sometimes customers ask us why we don't stock a specific brand. If we don’t stock a particular product it can be for one (or more) of several reasons:
 
1. We are a specialist cloth nappy store and aren’t really looking to expand into non-cloth nappy related products (I know many of you want us to do this – it ain’t happening!).
2. We test every nappy before deciding to stock it – unfortunately, some just don’t come up to scratch.
3. We don’t like to stock too many nappies of one type, or that are too similar in design (and come off second in comparison) to another brand we already stock.
4. A lot of your favourite WAHM brands don’t wholesale to retailers – if they had to add a wholesale mark up to their prices, either their nappies would be very expensive, or they wouldn’t be paying themselves enough for their work. They may also not be able to supply a retailer with the quantities they require.
5. Pretty much all the well known commercial brands have been in stock here at Darlings Downunder at one time or another over the last few years. If we don’t currently stock them, there’s usually a reason why that's connected with our previous experience (this doesn't preclude us from giving them another shot at some point!).
6. We are sometimes restricted by distribution agreements which mean that in the current economy it costs us more to get a brand from overseas than it does you, so it doesn’t make economic sense.
7. Sometimes there’s a really good reason an overseas brand can’t be found in Australia – legal action, product recalls, trade restrictions, ethical or manufacturing issues - and we steer clear.
8. You haven’t told us how good it is yet!
 
We look forward to hearing what you'd like to see at Darlings Downunder!


To be kept up to date with contests, giveaways and nappy related information on our blog, become a blog subscriber or pop your email address in the 'Get Notified' box (in sidebar under the calendar) and you'll be emailed when a new blog is posted.