Zola Baby 17+

We used Zola for our wedding and now I’m using it again for our baby shower- my favourite feature is the ‘get cash equivalent’ which means when people purchase stuff from your registry you just get the cash sent to your bank account. (They also have the option to purchase separately and notify Zola or yourself to mark as purchased).
Two reasons I love this: firstly, I was able to order things ahead of time, but still have them be giftable on the registry. Secondly, I was able to shop deals, buy secondhand, and otherwise be super thrifty to save myself and the gifters some money.

My husband and I used Zola for our wedding registry and it was great, so we were excited for them to come out with a baby registry. However, I really wish we had gone with another company. If you experience delays with wedding items, that’s usually fine, but you really can’t and shouldn’t delay items for moms-to-be trying to get baby essentials. Multiple items have been backordered, delayed, and cancelled, and the Zola Baby team have been very hard to get in touch with, not available by phone and delayed by a week in getting back to us by email. My baby came earlier than her due date, so we had to spend our own money to buy the essential items and the only option was to take Zola credit. Now more than three months after her birth, and many emails later, we finally did get through to customer service and were able to resolve the issues. I’m grateful for that, but on the whole, the experience has been disappointing to say the least. Who wants to fight with their registry when preparing and then making a home for baby? Do yourself a favor and go with a more established company instead.

I know that Zola Baby just launched recently, so it’s understandable that there are some pieces still in the works. This is as of October 23, 2023.

Pros -
•The process to add from a URL or other store is pretty smooth
•App is responsive and doesn’t seem to bug out
•Easy to add items to or remove from registry
•Easy to customize the end user landing page

Things I hope improve -
•Selection - there are currently multiple brands listed under the Add Gifts page which have 0 items when you tap into them. There are also lots of brands that have very little selection, when the actual brand has a ton more options
•Linking to other registries - I had to manually add everything that was on our Target and PB registry
•Sorting / grouping - items show in the order they’re added. I would love the ability to sort by category (not just filter to category). Also, sort order on the buyer’s registry page sometimes glitches and doesn’t sort properly.
•Manage registry on web app (they have said this is in the works).

Overall, I’ve had very positive experiences with Zola in the past for wedding registry, so I think the potential here is strong, it just seems like maybe it was launched before it was quite baked. Looking forward to future updates.