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Yeti soft cooler

Just looked at these yesterday and it's nice but not for the $350 price tag. Lots of soft side coolers for a lot less that hold ice really well, looks for the ones that have what looks like a foil lining. Made by TCB MFG in Laporte, IN - we use these for work to carry frozen samples and work great. I have used these for beer coolers as well and will hold ice for days and not leak, my friends have tried to steal my coolers since they work so well. Think we paid under a hundred bucks a piece for them. My new company uses another soft soft style and does not work near as well.

Plus if you are looking for a hard side cooler like the yeti SAMs has the Igloo sportsman that is identical to the yeti but for only $199..... Personally I think yeti's are more of a staus thing than anything else, lots of companies now have a same quality of cooler for a lot less. I rather save my money for add ons to the Benny :)
 
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Jack, I find your review flawed. It did not get to 80 degrees last year!!!

I was looking at my cabelas fishing catalog the other night and fell off the couch when I saw the cost of the big yeti cooler. Over $600 bucks to keep some ice longer? I'll drink a warm beverage before I spend that.

It is probably a great product but just not one that fits my needs.

Good luck and stay cool!
 
I have a Coleman 36 quart Xtreme cost 39.99 at Target. It has kept ice after a day at the lake then through the week boat is in the garage no ventilation I opened the cooler on Friday night and still had Ice. Wasn't expecting Ice. Works for me anyway! :)
 
The Yeti 420 is $1400. They named it appropriately becuse to buy that....you'd have to be high as a kite!

I know some folks that manufacture the Yeti's, one thing I can say is that their quality control is very stringent.
 
lakeliving said:
Jack, I find your review flawed. It did not get to 80 degrees last year!!!

I was looking at my cabelas fishing catalog the other night and fell off the couch when I saw the cost of the big yeti cooler. Over $600 bucks to keep some ice longer? I'll drink a warm beverage before I spend that.

It is probably a great product but just not one that fits my needs.

Good luck and stay cool!
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Believe it or not we did get up ti 80 at least 3 days  :p
 
I love my big Yeti for keeping ice. It's great for long hunting trips and keeping fish on ice when we're offshore fishing. I hate the fact that it doesn't have wheels and is obnoxiously heavy! Not to mention the handles are cumbersome to carry any distance.

For the Benny and on the lake, it's almost too much hassle to drag it in and out of the boat. I have a Coleman Extreme 62qt for our day boating trips. It's lighter, has wheels, a long handle, and cup holders on top. Ice makes it an entire day in direct sunlight but begins melting pretty quick by the end of day 2.
 
I personally like the "half sized" Igloo coolers with wheels. We have two. One for drinks, cans, bottles and the other for dry food (meat, cheese, sandwiches, etc stuff that cans and bottles tend to crush when kids dig around in them). The two smaller ones are easier to move around in tight quarters on the boat. They are small enough and have wheels so one kid can handle one cooler with ease and still carry other stuff. When I go out by myself, I only need one. Less ice, easy to drag down to the boat, etc. I don't think I could recommend a big cooler to anyone after using the two smaller ones and realizing the advantages.

I bought a can of white rubber spray coating that I plan to spray on the lids of all our coolers so stuff doesn't slide off the tops, which happens a lot on our boat. Stuff always seems to get put on them, then falls off eventually. Hopefully it wii help. We'll see.

The lids on most cheap coolers seem to not be insulated. Wondering if a can of Great Stuff spray foam would help with that...

http://www.amazon.com/Igloo-Island-Breeze-Roller-Cooler/dp/B002SU97BI/ref=sr_1_4?s=outdoor-recreation&ie=UTF8&qid=1426268698&sr=1-4&keywords=Igloo+cooler

By the way, one cooler stacks nice on the other. The telescoping handle is long enough to reach above the second cooler so you can pull both coolers with one hand. For rough terrain, a bungee cord will help keep the top one in place.
 
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I have a Yeti Tundra 45 and a Roadie. Love ours, yes they are a bit spendy but they really work well and use them all the time.  We use the Roadie a lot on the boat. Also looked at the Yeti Hopper (Soft Cooler) was not really impressed. I would say If you wanted a good soft cooler, the AO coolers would be a better choice. 
 
Get on YouTube and do a search of Yeti (and others) cooler reviews / tests.  There are a couple videos that show a time lapse over several days of most "top of the line" coolers being compared side by side.  Lets just say, I'll be saving lots of money.  The Yeti didn't fair well. 
 
spinzone said:
That's a whole lot of faith for $4.012mil!

Because I'm a math nerd, I had to do it.
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 That's $4012014.999 Round up to the nearest penny...$4012015.
 
For us, pretty much any cooler works for the 5-6 hours max we're on the boat. Matter of fact, I actually prefer the skinny walled coolers. You trade extra wall thickness for less internal space on the extreme coolers. I'd rather have that extra space. But I'm not out on the boat for days on end. Even a garbage bag will work as a cooler for a couple hours!

Nick on the other hand...
 
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kaydano said:
Nick on the other hand...
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Yeah, 5 days in 100 degree heat requires some thick walls and some serious effective cooler management (ECM). Just the ice block production in my deep freeze leading up to each trip is quite the task. Store bought ice can't hack it. But as far as something expensive like a Yeti vs. something cheap like a Coleman, I find it's better to spend $50-$100 on a Coleman Xtreme than hundreds (or thousands) on something like a Yeti. I was about ready to pull the trigger on the Yeti until I saw this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6-TE4RnqT0U. After that I picked up two 120 qt Coleman Xtremes from walmart.com for $52 a piece. I've still had solid ice in there at the end of every 5-day trip in the summer last year. 
 
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Nice share, Nick!

I like the term ECM. On my boat the cooler is opened and closed 30 or so times a trip (I can't keep Mrs. Spin out of the beer). The kids are also always into it as well.
 
I got that term from an old river runner who claimed he could make his coolers last for weeks. Here's a few things we do as part of our ECM:

  • A wet towel goes on top of the cooler whenever it has to be in direct sun (this is huge!)
  • Instead of loose ice, we freeze water bottles in the deep freeze. This keeps water from getting all over things and it makes it so you have ice cold water to drink if you're our there for a while (not applicable to most, but awesome for us on day 3 when we're mixing up some iced coffee in the morning or on a 100 degree summer afternoon). The home-frozen ice lasts so much longer than anything bought at the store, and it's free! I have a mix of 1 liter to 3 liter bottles I keep in the freezer so they're ready to go when I need them. 
  • For our boat camping trips, we use two coolers. One we stay out of for the most part and the other we get into throughout the day. The other one gets stashed in the shade with a towel on it, if possible, and we replenish the main cooler with it as needed. Then half way or more through the trip we can usually consolidate it all into one cooler. A full cooler stays cooler.
  • Everything has to be COLD before it goes in. For long trips, I've been known to freeze things, including cases of beer and bags of wine. 
  • We don't do it, but I've floated rivers with guys who put a piece of foam (like a thin sleeping pad) inside the top of their cooler so it holds the cold air down against all the food as things start taking up less space. 
Probably not a worry for people out doing day trips, but maybe that's helpful to someone. 
 
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Yes Excellent info bcpnick.   
 
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