If you are fortunate to have the joy of a cat or cats in your household, you understand the not-so-joyful task of cleaning up litter boxes frequently. As cat parents our time is precious and more of us are taking the leap into going automatic to allow us more time in our busy lives and to manage the litter box more effectively for our cats.
How do you choose the right one?
The market is inundated with so many brands, models, and prices that it is difficult to assess the best choice. While more established manufacturers conduct exhaustive engineering and testing to ensure the safest, best product possible, there are more quickly produced automatic litter boxes now available for the budget market. Having an automatic litter box is understood to be a necessary appliance for cat family households with many cats now being kept inside for safety and legislative requirement. Choosing one that fits your needs best is not easy.
Sadly, there have recently been a few reports of cat deaths tied to certain brands or rebranded devices that are unsafe for use. There are many posts on just about every social media platform asking for recommendations on which automatic litterbox is the safest as a result.
Consumer confidence is cautious and understandably so. We love our kitties, and it would be catastrophic if an appliance we purchased for convenience or need resulted in any injury to one of our furfamily.
I recently spent much time online, looking at different websites, reading reviews and I was still unclear. I kept asking myself the same questions: can I trust these reviews? Are they real? Were they paid for or generated by marketing or AI?
I then went to social media and Reddit but found that what I saw were individual opinions based on the brands purchased and either loved or hated.
What I needed was to see honest, independent, fact-based information from real cat parents. I have now located a good independent reviewer I trust. Philip Bloom. a British cat dad with a YouTube Channel called ‘One Man Five Cats’ provides honest, independent, fact-based information from someone who has purchased (not received free) many different automatic litter boxes, and has firsthand experience in operations: the good, the bad and the ugly.
To have a rounded view, its worthwhile checking a few other independent reviewers that I feel are helpful as well.
One Man Five Cats – Philip Bloom
Points to consider:
Where to go to from here?
You are welcome to ask questions or call if you would like more information on the LItter-Robot (3 and 4) by Whisker USA from the authorised Australian and NZ distributors. 1300 350 635 or sales@catevolution.com.au.
I'm also sure if you want to reach out to any of the reviewers, you should be able to fact-check easily and have confidence in making a well-informed choice for your move into an automatic litterbox lifestyle for you and your cats.
As a tip, do ensure you are using suitable clumping litter in the manual system before introducing the new box shape for faster transition to no more scooping.