The Doona Next Generation Car Seat

Disclosure: This is not compensated or sponsored post. I was provided the product for review purposes only. All opinions expressed here are my own.

As I walked around at this year’s New York Baby Show, this was one of the first products that caught my eye. I loved the design and the versatility.

The one issue with car seats is that they are heavy things, and can be difficult to use out and about. You usually need to make sure yours will adapt and work as a travel system, which means, as well as the car seat and all of your baby items, you need to fit the chassis of your pram in the boot as well. Which doesn’t leave room for much else if you’re planning a shopping trip or going away for the weekend.

The Doona™is a car seat that is not only approved and safe for your baby to use, but it also comes with inbuilt collapsible wheels, which convert it from a traditional car seat, into a mobile one. So you can take baby from car to wherever you like – it’s with you from A to B.

Not only is it extremely functional, and designed with the needs of parents in mind, but it’s also gorgeously designed, and you know it’s a Doona right away when you spot one, even when the wheels aren’t in use.

The Doona™also features a five point harness, is made from approved baby-safe materials, complies with the highest EU, US and even some local standards. And, in frontal collisions (the most common type of crash) it scored a high, five-star rating.

If you would like to know more about the safety of the Doona™ I would recommend visiting the Doona™ website as they have a lot of safety information available to put your mind at ease.

Rearward facing infant car seat

Infant Weight: 4-35 lbs
Infant Height: up to 32” (81 cm)
Product weight: 16.2 lbs

You can secure and fix it to your car by using the seat belt, as with many standard car seats, or the Doona Isofix Base, defending on whether or not your car has isofix points.

The Doona™ was developed over several years, with the key focus of making sure that baby was comfortable and safe, both inside, and outside of the car. The Doona™ is designed to achieve maximum protection for baby when in the car, performing to all safety regulations. It also has a design that is inspired by the position of a baby in its mother’s arms, making it much more comfortable for quick trips out and about in the stroller function. It also comes with an infant insert, to make sure your baby is safe and secure from birth on-wards. This supports your baby’s posture by mimicking a natural position – which is useful to know when they seem so fragile in those early days.

It comes in seven colors, I decided to go with Sky, as it was the color that stood out to me the most, and I liked that it was nice and bright. Someone also once told me that paramedics prefer bright car seats in the case of a crash as they can identify a car seat straight away and help the baby or child. Not the nicest fact in the world but worth noting all the same.

So, is it easy to get those wheels up and down with no issues.

The handle of the Doona™has three positions:

Anti-rebound – while in the car.
Upright – as a carrier.
Push – extended handle, while the wheels are down and in use.

You just set the handle to the upright position, and release the white lever at the back of the Doona, and, in one simple motion, the wheels come down and click into place. You can then move the handle into push mode and off you go. To collapse the wheels, move the handle back into the upright position, compress that same lever as before, and use one foot to guide the wheels backwards and up into the Doona body unit. Simple.

The Doona™ comes with a range of accessories to make using it even more convenient to use. We have the Snap On Storage, Rain Cover, and Seat Protector. The Snap On Storage for me personally is a genius idea.

I love that it has a Rain Cover that fits properly. It’s so useful for those drizzly days and it’s really well made – not the sort to tear over time. And it has a bag to keep it in as well. We always have ours to hand so we are never caught out. The Doona does have a canopy attached anyway, that could offer a little protection if you were caught in a drizzle while getting back to the car, but I would really recommend getting the Rain Cover as well.

And then there’s the Seat Protector. This is useful, but it can slide about a bit in our car, so I wonder if that could be a tweak for the future – just to make sure it’s properly fixed to the seat so it can protect them better. I would suggest that you could just lie an old blanket underneath instead, but I wouldnt’ want to risk that in case it lessens the effectiveness of the Doona’s™ installation and safety. So in that case, it’s worth buying if you have a nice new car and are precious about the seats!

I think it’s clear that I love the Doona™. And I’ll be honest actually, I didn’t expect to love it this much when I was offered it to review.

The Doona™ offers you a lot. It removes the need for a travel system, you could use that money elsewhere.

The amazing thing about the Doona is that it is so public transport-friendly. I will be taking the Doona™, purely because I can always collapse the wheels and sit her next to me on a seat, rather than lurk by the doorway of the train, which can get very busy. Plus, it’s compact enough to get around easily.

The website to link to is www.doonausa.com, to check out more great products.