My husband and I had our first child last month.  We’re thrilled with the arrival of our new son, but in sticker shock over the cost of essential baby items (diapers anyone?).  However, through trial and error (as well as the help of friends and family), we’ve come up with a list of money-saving tips for new parents.

• Accept gently used baby items from family and friends.  We received a baby swing, papasan chair, bassinet, baby clothing, high chair, changing table, car seat and bottle warmer from friends whose own kids had outgrown these things.
• Talk to friends and family about what worked and didn’t work.  Other parents are a great source of baby product information.  You might see a baby gadget that looks like a “must have,” but talking to a friend might reveal that the thing was a piece of junk.  Talk to a variety of people and find someone that has similar tastes and spending habits as you do.  Obviously, the friend who buys every new gadget is not going to give you good tips on essentials.  Your friends may have disagreements on what they like (”Diaper Genie beats the Diaper Champ!  No, it doesn’t!”), but at least you’ll get an idea what worked for different people.
• Get a copy of “Baby Bargains.”  Many people consider this book to be the bible on baby shopping.  This book was written by the same authors of the “Bridal Bargains Book,” and is full of reviews and suggestions.  The authors are good at trying to sort through what is a “nice thing to have” versus an essential.  They provide comparison guides, reader reviews, and talk about the best place to buy things.  One chart shows the cost for Huggies diapers at 8 different retail stores.  Another useful tip in the book was to avoid baby bedding sets.  The sets cost over $150 and contain items such as quilts that you’ll never use.
• Watch out for anything targeted for babies.  This is especially true for baby furniture, which are marked up simply because it’s a specialty market, just like wedding stuff.  Find out what you need to buy (”Baby Bargains” has some suggestions), how much you want to spend, and go to both baby specialty and regular furniture stores to comparison-shop.  We had a doozy of a time finding a reasonably priced baby dresser, but finally settled on a solid wood dresser that cost about $350.00 at an unfinished furniture store.  A comparable finished dresser would have cost upwards of $600.00.  I’ve never stained any furniture before, but it was remarkably easy to do and only cost me $23 in materials and about an 1 hour of total work spread over a couple days.
• Comparison shop online.  We found a great stroller for $90.00 on Amazon.  The same stroller was selling for $150 at a local store.  We also bought a pack-and-play which was on clearance at Target.com.  The reason it was on clearance?  The design print was being discontinued.  Because we didn’t care if our pack-and-play matched the stroller or car seat, we were perfectly happy to buy the item at a considerable discount.  Manufacturers routinely obsolete items to introduce new patterns and color schemes.
• Scour Sunday circulars for deals on diapers.  With newborns going through 10 or more a day, diapers are one of your biggest daily expenses.  Through the circulars, we found a great deal at Target; buy two large packs of diapers for $19.00 each and get a $5 gift card.  We used that gift card and rolled it right back into the next pack of diapers.  But be careful not to load up on too many diapers at once.  Babies grow like weeds and will graduate to the next size in no time at all.
• Sign up for baby product “clubs.”  Similac, Pampers, Huggies and many other baby item manufacturers have “clubs” that you can sign up for.  Once you sign up, you’ll start to get coupons in the mail for their products.  Similac sends out $5 coupons to members.  That’s a 20% savings off a large jar of formula powder.  We’ve also gotten lots of coupons from Pampers.
• Don’t go crazy with the cute baby stuff.  Remember that your adorable newborn baby will be a walking, talking kid before you know it.  So there is no need to sink thousands of dollars in that solid cherry oak crib, no matter how fabulous it looks in the store.  We bought a glider and ottoman from Walmart for $120, which is a fraction of the cost at the local baby store.  Although the fabric and pattern doesn’t look as chic as the gliders in the potterybarn kids catalog, we did not want to spend a small fortune on something we’ll only use for a couple of years.

Hopefully this list will help you save a few bucks.  Also, keep in mind that generous friends and family will likely inundate you with gifts of clothing, toys, gift cards, cash, etc.  So if you are expecting a child, resist the temptation to run to Babies-R-Us to stock up.  You may need to buy less than you think.