19 October 2022 – Chilly’s products
Chilly’s is a brand that I, among so many others, have come to love over the past several years. Chilly’s was founded in 2010, with the desire to create a solution to allow people to always have cold water with them and remove the need for single-use plastic bottles (Chilly’s Website 2022). From this ambition the first Chilly’s water bottle was born, a 500ml double-walled vacuum bottle that claimed to keep things cool for 24 hours and hot for 12. Since then, Chilly’s has taken the world by storm, expanding its range to include travel mugs and accessories and countless collaborations with designers and artists. Chilly’s makes it onto this blog because it perfectly embodies good design and helps tackle an issue that is so important to me.
Figure 1 - My Chilly's bottle - Image from the Chilly's website
Above you can see a recreation of my personal Chilly’s bottle (photos of mine bashed and battered to follow). I purchased this bottle in the summer of 2019 as I was about to go interrailing around some very hot countries in Europe. Unfortunately, I was unorganised and ordered it mere days before I left so I didn’t have the luxury of ice-cold water that my Chilly’s bottle would have provided. The bottle now costs £25, with the carabiner a £3 addition, and I think it was a similar price in 2019. This is a little pricier than others on the market, but Chilly’s performs the task of keeping things cool like no other bottle I have ever tried. Their claim to 24 hours of cold water is completely true and if anything, is maybe underselling the abilities of their bottle. I have used my bottle on a few occasions for coffee or other hot drinks and it keeps it scoldingly warm, I tend to avoid it for this use just as it can be hard to clean it well, like any bottle, because of the thin neck.
Figure 2 - My Chilly's bottle
These bottles are sturdy, you can see from the photos of my bottle the dents it has suffered, from being dropped, getting bashed around in my bag, and once flying off the passenger seat when being cut off at a roundabout. None of this has affected the functionality of my bottle, and I think the design lends itself well to this battered look. One of the best things about it is how leakproof it is. All my other water bottles leak a little bit, and it puts me off shoving them in my bag, whereas my Chilly’s bottle has never let out a single drip. The carabiner is valuable and strong enough to be clipped to the outside of a bag or rucksack, I also find it helpful for holding the bottle if I have my hands full.
Figure 3 - My Chilly's mug
This is the other half of my Chilly’s collection, my very well-loved travel mug. If you have read my previous blog posts you will know that I am a big, big coffee lover, and this travel mug has cemented itself firmly at the top of my favourite coffee-related items. It does everything a travel mug should do and does so impeccably. Here’s my list of why I love it;
It is huge!!! My regular coffee rarely fills it, which means it never spills out of the top. It also means that if I do want a stupidly big coffee I can.
It keeps your coffee as hot as it went in for hours and hours. This is great for so many reasons.
I can make hot drinks to take with me that I don’t intend to drink for the next few hours.
It encourages you to savour your coffee and take time to enjoy it instead of knocking it back for the caffeine kick before it goes cold.
I use it in the house or at work to limit the amount of coffee that I drink. When I discovered the free coffee machine at my summer internship, I can safely say I was drinking coffee like water, so I started bringing in my Chilly’s mug so my coffee would stay warm all day and I could just sip at it.
I am very forgetful and now I don’t need to throw my drink down the drain when I accidentally left it for 4 hours.
It's easy to clean. This is so important because it continues the ease of use throughout the entire product use cycle.
I love the way it looks, it's simple, sleek, stylish, and just a little bit interesting. It's also comfy to hold, and because it insulates so well it never burns your hand. I think that, just like the bottle, the bumps and bashes on it don’t ruin the look and suit the style quite well.
Figure 4 - Chilly's 'Refill' bottle collaboration - Image taken from the Chilly's website
Most of all I love the brand's mission. So often now there are products I love, however, I dislike the brand behind them. With Chilly’s I feel that my products come from a company that truly wants to make a difference about something I am passionate about. You can see above their ‘Refill’ bottle, which I know has been available for well over a year. £10 from the sale of each bottle goes to the charity ‘Refill’ which works to help create a world with less plastic and protect the oceans. You can see the cardboard packaging for the bottle, and there is no plastic whatsoever in their packaging, at no detriment to the product.
Figure 5 - Chilly's website home page - Image taken from Chilly's website
Chilly’s products embody all the elements of great design. They complete a task effectively, they are simple, yet visually appealing. The simplicity of their designs conveys the message of no frivolity or waste. They are long-lasting, in more ways than one, and are very high quality. They are extremely useful; I use my bottle almost every day. Most of all they are environmentally friendly, and in today’s world, I think this is the most important thing that good design should be.
Chilly’s is a brand I love and will continue to follow with great interest, as it continues to dominate the market. In the zero-waste world we strive to have these products make great gifts and with Christmas approaching why not buy something useful, effective, fun, and thoughtful for your loved ones that they will be able to keep for decades to come?
Chilly’s website: https://www.chillys.com/uk/
Refill website: https://www.refill.org.uk/
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