Laura and I both opt’d to register with Amazon for our baby registries. We loved the simplicity of just going with one huge store where you can buy everything for baby (even those unconventional items that you may not think of immediately).

Obviously, you don’t build a registry planning to return a bunch of things … it’s bad for the environment and you registered for the things because you need them! But along the way of planning for baby, there could be a few instances where returning gifts makes a lot of sense.

These were the top reasons for me:

• There are other things you need more. Let’s be honest, people buy you the fun stuff, but there are things you NEED!
• Large items. Wow, baby things take up a lot of space! If you have an early shower or eager friends, you might end up with so big things before you have the nursery cleared out and ready.
• Older baby items. It’s easy to get wrapped up in registries and as you are filling yours you may end up adding things for down the road. But if you get them early, you’ll have to store them not only till baby arrives but until they grow old enough to use them.
• Duplicate gifts. It happens, some items are just too cool or cute or perfect and your friends think alike and you’ll get duplicates.
• Recalls and/or an issue with the item that arrived. I have yet to experience a recall on any of my gifts (though Laura has) but have found some flaws as I looked closely at items and that prompted a return.
• Changing your mind. I had a few instances where I changed my mind about an item after doing more research during pregnancy and decided I wanted a different brand or type after it had already been purchased.
• Better Price. I personally find that Amazon is very competitive with their pricing, however, it’s a good idea to keep your eye out for deals on things you’ve gotten. If you find a substantially better price, it could be worth returning the item and buying elsewhere. And if it is a really expensive item, you can always buy it with your completion discount later.

Pro Tips for figuring out if you should keep things:

• Start reading the books you receive even if you are still pregnant. My husband reads to our baby most nights before we go to bed and it’s a fun way for us both to connect to the baby and also to try out some of the books we’ve received. For us, it also meant that we found a few books that we ended up not liking (some children’s books are weird) and we also found a few with printing errors (upside down or missing pages).
• Don’t take off tags or wash things right away. You never know what else you will get or what will come down the road as hand-me-downs. You certainly don’t want to procrastinate too long with getting things unpacked, washed and ready, but gifts start coming early and it’s good to get an idea of the big picture before you fully commit.
• Register for things that can be returned. Be mindful that some items will be easier to return than others, often it’s a bit more difficult to return items from third-party sellers. Especially in the case of duplicates, you may need to return one thing vs. the other depending on policies related to those gifts in particular. I personally only ran into this once and luckily it was an item I wanted but had just gotten really early so I ended up just keeping it vs. going through the hassle of trying to return to a third party.

Amazon makes it very easy to return items and there are some ways to do returns more sustainability as well. Gifts purchased from your Baby Registry are eligible for free returns within 365 days of the receipt of your shipment.

Has anyone else had success returning Amazon baby registry items? Let us know about your experience in the comments!