Parents outraged at Snoo after smart bassinet company charges fee for some coveted features

The robotic bassinet — which many parents purchase secondhand — costs $1,700

A child sleeping in a Snoo bassinet. The Snoo bassinet is equipped with sensors to track a baby’s sleep, a self-rocking feature, and requires the infant to be strapped in to help prevent SIDS. Happiest Baby, which makes the Snoo, recently changed its pricing structure, locking some of its features behind a $20 per month subscription (Snoo/Happiest Baby)

Some parents are complaining that a high-tech bassinet company is nickel and dime-ing them through a monthly subscription program.

The new parents are upset because some functions of the $1,700 Snoo bassinets — which have a massive resale market — are now locked behind a “premium” subscription paywall that secondhand users will have to pay for, the New York Times reports.

One might ask: "what — beyond being being soft and portable — other functions could a bassinet have?"

The Snoo, made by the "Happiest Baby" company, is equipped with sensors that detect when the baby is crying and simulates the sounds of the womb to help keep babies — and their parents — sleeping with fewer interruptions. The bassinet also includes a self-rocking and sleep tracking feature, among others.

But now many of the robot bassinet’s features — some of them new — are only available through the premium subscription, which costs $20 per month for the many parents who purchase the crib secondhand. If parents use the bassinet for five months, that's an extra $100 fee.

A child sleeping in a Snoo bassinet. The Snoo bassinet is equipped with sensors to track a baby’s sleep, a self-rocking feature, and requires the infant to be strapped in to help prevent SIDS. Happiest Baby, which makes the Snoo, recently changed its pricing structure, locking some of its basic features behind a $20 per month subscription (Snoo/Happiest Baby)

Since babies grow quickly, a bassinet is only useful to parents for approximately four to five months. At that point, many parents either hand down their newborn gear to friends or relatives with newborns, or post them for sale on online hand-me-down markets.

With the new pricing scheme in place, the Snoo will be able to continue collecting cash from parents even after its been handed down several times.

Parents angry with the change has prompted some backlash, with calls for review bombs and instructions for how to complain to the company being shared on social media.

Happy Baby customers received an email in June alerting them to the change in pricing. Buyers who picked up a Snoo before July 15 were grandfathered into the previous structure, and parents who purchase their bassinet directly through the company are given a free nine-month premium subscription for each child who uses it.

Andrew Gwin, a father who bought the Snoo, told the Times he likened the new pay structure to having to shell out extra to use an iPhone's camera or a car's radio.

He said he had a great experience using the Snoo with his first child. The family has a second on the way, but said they won't be paying for the subscription. He has gone so far as to file a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission over the app's price.

A baby who is wide awake and not sleeping in its Snoo (PA Archive)

“It’s clearly a way to punish those who go to the secondhand market and just add a tax on top of the expenses the parents already face,” he told the Times.

The company's founder, Harvey Karp, said the pricing change was necessary to "bring in revenue," noting that the company was not underwritten by a university or the government, and must survive on its sales alone.

He said his ultimate goal would be to see the Snoo paid for by the government or by insurance companies, but it's unclear if there has been any substantive movement toward achieving that end.

Karp is a pediatrician, and said he developed the Snoo in order to help prevent SIDS — sudden infant death syndrome. Babies placed in the Snoo have to be strapped in, preventing them from rolling around. That nighttime movement can lead to SIDS, according to the US Centers for Disease Control.

Approximately 3,400 babies die from SIDS every year, the CDC reports.

Editor’s Note: This story has been updated to reflect that basic features like rocking remain free, and buyers who purchased or rented the basinett from Happiest Baby and “authorized retailers” will receive free premium subscriptions.