My wife and I just had twins this past December (2013). It was so exciting! From as soon as we found out we were pregnant we had a feeling it was two and we were certainly right. Two beautiful little boys fraternal boys with personalities that are as different as their looks. After the shock of “Congratulations you’re having twins!” wore off I had a grave and expensive realization… diapers. Luckily my fourth child potty trained just before the twins were born so we didn’t have three in diapers at once!

Currently at my home we go through about 100 or more diapers in a week. This was pretty expensive, even with Walmart prices, so I did some homework and found some better ways to get more and pay less.

You see, I don’t like buying ‘cheap’ diapers for two reasons:

1. They are not as absorbent, hence they leak more often, especially at night!

2. Cheap diapers seem to be designed to fit a two-by-four. They don’t wrap around and stay in place as well as other brands.

So, for these reasons, I don’t like buying cheap diapers.

*Note. All babies are NOT the same size and shape It’s kind of a guess and check. So be prepared to try a few brands to get the best fit. When I say ‘cheap diapers’ I’m referring to Walmart and Loves brand diapers which are thinner and not as absorbent.

First secret: buy in bulk. The larger packages contain more diapers and overall the prices are lower per diaper. Yes, it’s more out of pocket up front but saves a ton in the long run. I’ve learned to buy a big package near payday.

Second secret: Choose where you buy diapers wisely. Now, depending on where you shop the price per diaper in the large package varies. The best place I’ve found to buy diapers is Babies-R-Us. The second best place is Target. Babies-R-Us also does price matching on their stuff. Babies-R-Us sells bulk packages for $42 and they also run promotions of buy one bulk pack and get one half off. Pretty sweet deals.

When you think about it the places that want to be known for selling baby stuff are going to make it a priority to have the best prices around. Babies-R-Us and Target fit this category.

Third secret: Coupons. Now I don’t really do this one ‘cause I’m just not a coupon kind of dad but some brands like Huggies have loyalty programs where you enter a code online and can earn point, coupons etc.

If all these late nights has fried your brain, here is the formula to calculate the price per diaper:

Price of package of diapers divided by the number of diapers in the package. It’s that easy. Sometimes the ‘unit pricing’ or price per diaper will be on the left hand side of the price tag. Beware of this though because grocery stores mess with unit pricing in sneaky ways to get you to buy their store brands, so read the fine print on the tag.

For my thoughts on cloth diapers click here.