Gadget Discovery Club – May 2020

The idea behind the Gadget Discovery Club is to discover an exciting and useful lifestyle gadget every month. It costs £25 per month for a monthly subscription, though this price is reduced for longer subscriptions.

The website promises ‘You’ll get state-of-the-art gadgets, expertly picked by our tech buyers, including epic Smarthome Devices, the latest Music Tech, Wearables, Smartphone Gadgets & more!’

This is the only box from them I’ve had, so my impressions are based solely on this one.

The box comes wrapped in bubblewrap in a mailing bag. There’s nothing on the outer packaging, but I assume that’s for security and anti-theft purposes.

I can definitely hear something heavyish rolling around in there.

This is what is inside. There’s no card or menu, just the item.

It’s called a Smoovii. 

It’s a portable blender!

This is what’s inside the box. The blender attachment with a glass top, a lid, a micro USB lead, and a little leaflet with instructions and a few recipes.

It’s very simply to work, and the USB charging aspect, as well as the small size,  is what makes it portable.

The battery is 4000mAh, which apparently will make you around 22 drinks.

It comes with a lid and the blending jar acts as storage and cup at the same time.

There’s also a rubber wrist strap that is supposed to thread through a hole in the lid, but I actually couldn’t get it to squeeze through no matter how much I pushed.

The blender blades themselves are nice and sharp, and while it’s not a heavy duty blender (it won’t crush ice) it will make quick work of fruit and vegetables and normal smoothie ingredients.

So it’s simple to use, but your ingredients in the jar, then flip over and switch on.

This item retails direct from Smoovii for £39.99, with discounts for multiple purchases. So you’re definitely getting a deal over retail.

All in all this is a neat gadget. However I do have some reservations.

It’s probably rather an unfortunate coincidence that a portable item has been selected during a period of national lockdown! I do understand that these things are planned rather far in advance though, and of course the current circumstances could not have been foreseen. So I’m trying to imagine using this in normal circumstances, for example when I travel to work.

I’m not quite convinced by the practicality. I actually think that the fact that the jar is glass is very good, because I don’t like plastic, but for a portable item I would be very nervous about carrying it around in my bag without a certain amount of protective covering.

Also, it’s nice to have a lid, but the blender jar is what you drink from, so the blades are left exposed. And they are really sharp. I supposed you have to drink fast and cover them up again. The lid implies that you could carry the finished drink separately, but again, you are left with the base and blades.

It’s pretty easy to clean, just add soap and water and whizz.

I can see this being useful in a caravan or motorhome, as it’s lovely and compact, but I just can’t imagine it being that practical for day to day use.