Category: Uncategorized

meetfellow.com new kids on the block: my review

someone sent me this link a few days ago and it looks like there is a new company in town!!! super cool

the brand: good

i look the look and fellow its simple and clean. why does everyone brand want to have a generic black guy or ambiguous guy in their marketing? is this some new branding agency thing? i dont get it, is this really what they think we look like? i dont hang out on the tub when masturbating lolllll

process: slow

it seems slower than other brands ive seen in this space. why 10 days?? every other company that does sperm testing (legacy, sppare.me, yo, even cryochoice) are within a week, and yo is instantaneous.

the kit: good

but i like the way the it is designed, it looks simple and easy to use

the price: okay

theyre cheaper than sppare.me once you factor in morphology

theyre more expensive than legacy

theyre way cheaper than cryochoice

overall price point seems okay

the service: for doctors?

this was interesting to me, seems like they are really focusing on the service for doctors which makes sense, i havent seen anyone else do that

CryoChoice: what do you think?

i read about CryoChoice seriously for the first time in a daily beast article and so i checked out their website. honestly they look fine but WHAT IS UP WITH THIS PHOTO!!!

super creepy…….

anyway so here are my thoughts:

-their pricing is $595, which is higher than sppare.me, legacy, dadi or yo by FAR

-good customer service, they were responsive when i wrote in and they claim to have seven days a week, i like that

-they have morphology as an ADDITIONAL service for $100, so actually you’re paying $695 for a full semen analysis (sppare.me also does this; legacy includes morphology; dadi only does volume and count; yo only tests count)

-annual storage is $149 so about the same as other companies

-so overall i guess it’s not clear to me why i would pick them over any of the other companies i wrote about it. but if you work at cryochoice hit me up i’d love to try your service! maybe im missing something?

legacy vs dadi vs sppare.me sperm freezing options

i started off the journey by planning to freeze my sperm, so this is the most important piece to me. i’m saving a piece about sperm analysis coming up next. 

now of course it depends what you are looking for but overall, legacy was the clear winner for me. if you have any other recommendations for companies to try please send them my way, i know there are a few like fairfax cryobank or cryochoice that i didn’t try but i did try legacy, sppare.me, dadi, and yo. make sure you read the full reviews of each! especially since the pricing below is not comprehensive and there are additional details to view. i excluded yo from below since they are an analysis-only product. 

 

Legacy
195
Sppare.me
250
Dadi
199

#4: Yo! – you can’t do freezing! Yo is a no go!

there are some additional factors to consider. it seems that i am not the first person to think of doing this (check out Fin vs. Fin: https://finvsfin.com/dadi-vs-legacy-vs-yo-sperm/ who ranked legacy 1st, dadi 2nd, yo 3rd).

so: inspired by them I am adding a few things that seem distinctive:

  1. dadi & yo are the only two companies to include a video of your sperm with the sample
  2. legacy is the only company to provide customers a dedicated advisor/resource
  3. yo is the only product available on Amazon, with a 4-star rating!

legacy vs dadi vs sppare.me sperm analysis

ok so i figured i might as well do a round-up of my thought on sperm ANALYSIS for anyone else who is going through a similar journey! i realized i am not alone – you have millions of couples trying to have kids and — NEWS FLASH — men are 50% of the equation for hetero couples! so everyone should be testing their sperm.

now of course it depends what you are looking for, but overall, legacy was the clear winner for me. if you have any other recommendations for companies to try please send them my way, i know there are a few like fairfax cryobank or cryochoice that i didn’t try but i did try legacy, sppare.me, dadi, and yo.

i’ll start by talking about the at-home sperm analysis options. i’ll do a separate post on at-home sperm freezing. note: the prices below are not totally comprehensive, so check out the full reviews for the details.

Legacy: https://spermfreezing.home.blog/2019/12/01/legacy/

Sppare.me: https://spermfreezing.home.blog/2019/11/10/sppareme/

Dadi: https://spermfreezing.home.blog/2019/11/24/dadikit/

Yo: https://spermfreezing.home.blog/2019/10/27/trying-a-test-at-home-yo/

Legacy
195
  • Best for analysis & freezing
Sparre.me
250
  • Good for analysis & freezing
Dadi
199
  • Good for basic analysis & freezing
Yo
75
  • Best for a basic analysis

For analysis:

#1: Legacy – as detailed as getting your analysis at a clinic
includes volume, count, concentration, motility, morphology
includes lifestyle recommendations tailored to you

#2: Yo! – basic analysis but cheap and fast
includes count & concentration

#3: Sppare.me – also detailed, but you can’t get analysis done separately
includes volume, count, concentration, motility, and (optional for +$100) morphology
you can’t do analysis separately and requires an std test

#4: Dadikit – basic analysis, can’t get analysis done separately
includes volume, count, concentration
you can’t do analysis separately, and there is a fee to cancel storage

experience 5: legacy sperm testing and sperm freezing at home kit

ok, so i wanted to make sure i tested out all the kits that i could find! there are a few others but i think this is probably enough for now. so i saw a few articles talking about legacy and decided to give it a try. here are my thoughts below:

overall:

i LOVED legacy!!!! by far the best experience i’ve had so far. super fast, super easy, great results, great quality, at the same price point as other products. i don’t think they do a good enough job explaining why they are better than other products because it wasn’t clear to me until i actually went through the process.

something i hadn’t considered is that they offer an FSA product! so i actually got it for free through my employer before the end of the year and you probably could do it using FSA/HSA as well. not sure if other companies offer this.

and this seems to be the only company that actually lists their team – you can tell these guys (and gals!) are super legit

price: $195 + $145 for storage

pros:

-loved the website, the kit etc. felt very high end with an unboxing experience like i was buying an apple product… for sperm lollll. i posted a fancy photo in addition to the unboxing photos.

– really good analysis, they test for everything (volume count concentration motility morphology), and they even give you personalized recommendations

-super responsive customer service. i had my own client service advisor who i called and e-mailed!! thank you davide!

-the company is super legit. they started at harvard and won a bunch of awards

-i got the kit in 12 hours! and fedex actually came to pick up and drop off my kit, so i didn’t have to go anywhere like i did with other products

cons:

-the user log-in experience is a bit weird, they give you a CLIENTID which is supposed to keep you anonymous but i kept forgetting it and having to look it up. the online user experience is a bit clunky

-i love the look and feel of the product but it feels a little bit impersonal… also the inside of the box also didn’t feel as premium as the outside which was surprising.

– i found the concept of ‘multi geography storage’ a little confusing but i guess it’s a good thing. it also seems like they store ‘up to 6’ vials which is more than others (i got 5). but i’m not exactly sure how that works compared to other companies.. overall i don’t think they communicate as clearly as others

but overall the best i’ve had so far. if you have other recommendations please send them my way!!! i now have my sperm frozen in 3 different places lolll

experience 4: trying the “dadi kit” for at home sperm freezing

ok boys and girls – when i go deep into a topic, i go DEEP! so after i had tried sppare me, i kept researching and found a company called dadi (lol)

so overall they seem decent. apart from the name i liked their website a lot, cool design, cool packaging, feels very sleek. . they show you a video of your sperm, which is cool, like yo. but they are like sppare.me and don’t list their team at all. what’s up with that?

most of all their customer service is really bad, and their “fertility report” is vague and not really helpful, although i liked the video of my sperm. my results came back a lot worse with dadi than they were with sppare.me and yo which was weird. i tried contacting them but they were not helpful at all.

still at this price point you get what you pay for, so it would probably be a toss up between sppare.me and dadi.

cost: $199 + $99 per year for storage (plus $300 to use or $30 to destroy)

overall:

-loved their website, very cool packaging, feels slick

-their customer service is bad

-fertility report is vague and not very useful

pros:

-looks cool, very easy and simple to use, they’ve thought a lot about user experience!

-they store your sperm in 3 vials giving you 3 attempts at fertilization

-very straightforward and easy to understand process

cons:

-terrible customer service. no phone number, no response to my chat, and when i emailed it took them 2 days to reply and their response was always “we do not provide any medical diagnostic support but we recommend you review the results with your primary medical provider or with a fertility specialist.”

-fertility report only tests volume, count, concentration (sppare.me tests motility and morphology as well). also, my results came back a lot worse than other companies… why?

-like sppare.me, i think its kind of shady that they don’t list their team on the website

experience 3: trying a mail in sperm freezing kit (sppare me)

ok so now that i had tried a test at home, i learned more and started googling options to actually try a mail in kit. the cool thing about this is they are not super expensive, you get an analysis done at a clinic and then you can choose to freeze your sperm.

it felt like these guys (or gals?) really understand their target market. they even list out their ‘focus groups’ like cancer patients, steroid users, hair loss treatments etc which is cool.

one weird thing is they required me to get an std test. i had done one a few months ago but it had to be within 45 days so i had to get it done AGAIN which was annoying.

it was also kind of shady that they listed advisors but no team… i want to know who is handling my data and my sperm, you know? when i looked up my doctor (matan yemini) he seemed ok

cost: $250 and then $145 per year for storage

overall:

-not bad! i liked these guys. it felt like i had a mini clinic at home

-they required me to do an std test!!

-more expensive than other mail in options

pros:

-they offer financing, which i took advantage of (just curious!)

-they include a year of storage for you

-you can mail it in from home

cons:

-pricing is ok but i found cheaper options

-packaging was honestly pretty confusing

-they have sperm all over their website lollll

-why do they list an advisory board but no team????

experience 2: trying a test at home (Yo!)

so i figured, ok, are there any options that i can do at home or from home? this seems to be a big trend with all the genetic testing, hormone testing, all the hims ads im seeing.. so I googled ‘sperm testing at home’

i did some research and i found a couple of companies that i liked. there was one called ‘spermcheck’ that seemed kind of shady. my favourite was a company called YO! loved the name!! here’s the site: https://www.yospermtest.com/

i was a little weirded out about the fact that you have to attach something to your phone and then analyze your sperm, but they promised that i wasn’t going to have sperm all over my phone.

they said it wasn’t compatible with my iphone X max but it does work on a regular iphone x which was fine since i still had my old one.

it cost me $75 including shipping and taxes

overall:

-the experience was generally not bad. they have clear instructions for what to do although i kept feeling worried that i was going to spill everything everywhere!!

-the results were ok but not super useful. i did not feel like i really got a fertility test.

-they show you a video of your sperm is cool but… idk, whats the point? its not really telling me anything

pros:

-cheap

-although it took a few days to ship, i was able to do it at home

-straightforward

-you get a video of your sperm

cons:

-did not feel like a really good analysis, it felt shallow… so whats the point?

-this is stupid but i realized afterwards that i (obviously) can’t freeze my sperm if i’m using an at home test like yo… so not that useful in the end!

-you have to attach a device to your phone (not that big a deal)

this was the box i received. im not able to rotate the image but you get the picture!

experience 1: going to a local clinic

so, step 1 was to go and check out a local clinic. i figured this was probably the best option. since we’re based in austin i went to see the austin fertility institute ( https://www.austinfertilityinstitute.com/). a few things:

overall:

it didn’t feel like the right fit for me. i wasn’t super excited about going to masturbate at a clinic where it felt like everyone there was sick or struggling with fertility issues. but most of all, it was suuuuper expensive compared to some of the other options i found.

pros:

-it’s always nice to speak with a doctor about this stuff

-good location, easy access by car, friendly staff

cons:

-EXPENSIVE!!!!

-it felt like i was going to a hospital. they kept asking me if i was freezing my sperm because of a medical condition

-they wanted me to masturbate on site!! not super pumped about that.