I Tried a Stainless Steel Litter Box So You Don’t Have To (But You Probably Will)

As you know, I have pets. We recently lost one, but we still have two kitty mouths to feed. And, inevitably, two little butts to clean up after.

Naturally, when one sees The Blep, one must Boop. But first, I took a picture, because I'm not made of stone. Come on, can you blame me?  No.

Figgy is also not very amused, but still shows me The Blep. ANYWAY.

So for a long time, we were dealing with the usual stuff everyone has to sort out.  How many litter boxes should we have, where should they be, what litter should we use, etc etc.  It's never ending, really.  Even if you've got something that works, you tend to keep your eyes open for a better way.

Then, I saw this on the TikkyTokky.

Now, I’ve never spent money on a litter box that didn’t originate in the People’s Republic of Walton. So yes, I gasped. Loudly. But NJ told me to order one and we'd just try it. If it was awful, we'd return it. That seemed fair.

So, we ordered a sixty dollar litter box.

I didn't want to admit that out loud, but here we are.

We Tried The Stainless Steel Litter Boxes

It comes in several different sizes. You can get smaller ones, but I started with a relatively large one.  You can get one with a front "entrance" or a side "entrance".

This one was large — 20x13x12 — and came with a little step for Figgy. She’s a bit older than Yooonji, and deserves an easier climb. (The step also doubles as a litter catcher, which is helpful, because cats fling litter like they're in a Vegas magic act.)

The scooper itself is fine.  It's not too fine, and the holes are not too thick.  It's sturdy, made of a tough plastic that doesn't buckle.  Sometimes I've found that thicker scoops let smaller poops through the holes.  When you have a little one you remember what that's like, ha. And I admit, I liked the design.   Most of them have a little tab on them so you can hang them easily on the side of the box.

The high sides are great. They cut down on the Olympic-level litter kicking that tends to land squarely in the middle of my dang fool carpet. We’ve got a mat under the box too, but we noticed: less litter on it now.

The big test was, will they use it   And if they do, will they like it?

Turns out, all three kitties liked the litter box.  Kitten was having different problems at the time (which I'm sure I don't need to get into again), but all three girls liked the box.  We deliberately chose to get a stainless one for this litter spot to test how it would handle the smells.  It was an experiment, if you will.

We had four litter boxes at the time we bought this one.  This one in NJ's study, one in the living room, one in the back bedroom, and one in the bathroom.  This one was never the favorite spot, because the others offer more cover and privacy.  NJ tends to keep it brightly lit in there. So, you know, the vibes weren't super breaktime friendly.  But instantly, this became a favorite for them.

We ended up replacing all four with stainless steel boxes.  Not all of them are that big - one of them is much smaller - but overall, we think it lives up to the hype.

Our Thoughts About The Product

1. It does reduce smell.   We stay on top of cleaning the boxes (every day), but even when cleaned daily, plastic holds onto smells like a grudge. The stainless box? Doesn’t. It's eerily neutral.

2.  It is easier to scrape.  You know how in your litter box, sometimes the pee gets stuck to the bottom of the box and it takes some inhuman level of strength to shift it, and then when you do, it just goes everywhere and what was the POINT, you know?   With the stainless ones, I have had ONE instance where pee got stuck for second, and it ended up instantly moving.  In general, I have to spend way less time on scooping because it just all comes up pretty easily.

3.  It is aesthetically cuter. It does come with cute little scoopers and so we have one for each box. I feel like a very organized janitor.  They do come in different shapes, as well - like, there's a different side they can use for exiting.  The outside is easier to wipe down, and it actually looks shiny and clean when you're done. Which plastic never gave me. It never promised me that, but I still wanted it subconsciously

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4.  It seems to be more sturdy. The girls do scrape the box with their claws, but that hasn't  caused damage to the box. It just sounds like a swishwishsssh noise.  I also found that for the longest time with the old boxes, Figgy would scratch and scratch the litter box, trying to get her paws clean. Even if they seemed clean already. Like, there was just something that bothered her, so she'd spend sometimes as long as five minutes in the box after she was done, scratching.   Now, she does maybe one or two passes and she moves on.  She doesn't linger in the box like she used to. I think it actually feels cleaner to her.

5.  It is expensive.  Pricier than I would have liked to pay. I’ll be honest — it hurt a little. Well, I guess I'm just one of those people who never paid more than fifteen bucks for a litter box, so it SEEMS expensive to me.  We've got four boxes, and NJ probably paid a little over two hundred bucks, total. Like I said earlier, the price depends on the size.   Some were smaller than others so they were less expensive, and our biggest one was obviously the most pricey.   I've seen them range from forty to a hundred dollars, depending on size and bells and whistles, all that.  I think you could find some on sale for about twenty five.  But that's still double what I'm used to paying. But you can find them online (Amazon has a ton)  if you want a deal deal... if you want to be sure you're not getting scammed, or if you want to hold and see it in person before you buy, they have some at places like Petsmart here in town.  I haven't seen too many, but there are some at least.

The Final Verdict?

Yes, we replaced all our litter boxes with stainless steel. No, I didn’t think I’d become the kind of person who had opinions about metal box dimensions. But here we are. Life is weird. Cats are picky. And I think we might actually be winning.

At least in the bathroom department.

Scoopingly yours,

Behka