Purina Tidy Cats Hooded Litter Box System, BREEZE Hooded System Starter Kit Litter Box, Pellets & Pads

First a bit of background.... We started using the breeze system 4 years ago when a new kitten introduced into our multi cat home wrecked havoc and pissing wars. She and the youngest tribe member were pissing everywhere in an attempt to establish dominance. The conversion to the breeze system was pretty effortless back then. I kept a regular box next to the breeze and pretty quickly they all showed their preference for the breeze. Now we've got five boxes around the house for four cats and we have 100% litter box compliance (we had to rehome the kitten who is now blissfully happy in a two cat house).When Purina announced the new hooded box, it wasn't actually a necessity but alas I admit, I am a sucker for new versions of great products. I wanted to use the hooded box in a more trafficked area of the house so the litter could be better hidden.The box with the hood is great. It looks small and I see that some folks say it is too small for their cats. We have two relatively small cats and two that are large. In the first week that this was put into use, it was by far the cats' favorite box and needed scooping and pad changing much sooner than the other breeze boxes. I haven't not as yet seen any out of the box splash.For those of you new to the breeze system, it is absolutely amazing. The pee stays on the pad below and almost never does the odor carry. The poop sits on top of the pellets or slightly under them if your cat buries it. The poop becomes hard shortly after landing on these pellets and it is a breeze (ha!) to scoop. The ONLY problem I ever encounter was a splash of diarrhea that require the box to be cleaned with water. But that would be true of any litter box hit with watery stool.The pads for these boxes have been ridiculously expensive (unless you purchase the scented pads which we all found pretty toxic). But now several companies seem to be making knock off pads so I noticed that purina recently dropped their price significantly. I'll be keeping an eye on this pricing to see if it lasts.BOTTOM LINE: Like other cat owners, I too have tried COUNTLESS litter systems over the year including expensive electric machines and actual toilet training kits for cats. (While I loved the toilet training and it worked superbly for one of the cats, the other one at the time refused to try it so we had to scrap the whole thing). For my money, this breeze system is the single best cat waste system. It is so easy to clean, doesn't require daily maintenance (unless you want to) and the cats love it. With the added hood it just makes the whole litter situation that much more discreet. Oh, and did I mention how much less expensive I've found this to be in the long run? Its a win win win.

This litter system is genuinely life changing, and that’s not even an exaggeration. It’s improved both our lives re: cleaning and Miss Kitty’s re: using it. All the essay-length, updated-multiple-times reviews on here aren’t lying. It’s been about a year since we got it and it’s been worth every penny. So here’s my essay length review.Miss Kitty likes to pee in the same corner every. single. time. Without fail. That meant that when we still used regular litter, that corner was always extra gross. Didn’t matter how well the litter was designed to clump. Also the older Miss Kitty gets, the less she cared about keeping her feet clean, so she was tracking grody footprints everywhere. She also had litter stuck in the fur between her paws which couldn’t have been comfortable. And she was kicking the litter out and then grippin’ it in her paws, so she was tracking litter everywhere, no matter what we did to clean. Since she likes to sleep on our bed all the time, we were getting desperate for a solution.So I went searching and came across this (I think from a Reddit suggestion iirc). I read a bunch of the reviews, the multiple updates, the photos, the hacks. It sounded too good to be true. Good news: it’s true.The major pros:• The lack of smell. Oh man, that right there is one of the biggest pluses. Cat ammonia permeates everything and I hate the idea that I could become nose blind to it and then have family or friends over who could smell it. Scented cat litter was never an option because then Miss Kitty would walk by all perfumed but all that did was make me think of the fact that she just got out of the litter box. Ew. And then later that turned into scented cat ammonia when cleaning it out. Ew. This system is - somehow - 98% scent free, even when it’s time to change a batch of pellets. Truly magical.• The near lack of “ew” factor when cleaning out the poop or pee pad. You know what I mean, re: regular litter.• The pellets are advertised to work for 4 weeks, but we usually get about 6 weeks out of each batch. Each batch uses 3.5lbs of pellets and that looks like it isn’t enough if you’re coming from regular litter, but since it doesn’t need to absorb liquid, it’s definitely sufficient. They also mask the poop smell impressively well. There’s a little odor while it’s fresh, but the zeolite pellets dry it out quickly.• The pee pads are magical. I’ve used “magical” a few times, but I really mean it. Absolutely ZERO cat urine smell, no matter how full or even over-full they get. I don’t know how they do it. Based on plenty of other reviews, I’m pretty sure every new Breeze system owner accidentally lets a pad go too long at least once until it’s swimming in urine (gross) and then has a mixed bag of emotions of “ew!” and “how is there no smell??” We have to change the pad on a schedule because there will be no odor to remind us. With one cat, we change it once a week (the night before trash day).• Both the pads and pellets are available locally in PetSmart and Petco. No generics though.• Clean paws! No more disgusting footprints in the hallway. Her toe beans have never looked so perfectly clean and pink. She’s 20yo, so anything to help her hygiene helps her out.• No more litter everywhere. The pellets are too big for her to grip in her paws, so she can’t track them beyond the immediate vicinity of the litter box.• It’s easier to keep an eye on her health. Looking at her poop and seeing the color of her pee are good insights into her health and if anything changes, especially as she gets older. Also it’s really easy to use a dip strip indicator by just pressing it into the pee pad right after she gets out of the box.• The cover that flips back is great, compared to having to unclip the entire top each time. Makes cleaning out the poops easy, but keeps things covered and out of sight. It’s a small detail but it’s helpful.• Since there’s no regular litter with clay to conceal, the dried poop can just be tossed down the toilet. Makes it easier to clean more often.• Since the pellets dry everything out quickly and the pee is absorbed by a pad in the lower tray, the box just needs to be washed in between each batch of pellets, so about every 6 weeks.• Even with buying brand name pads and pellets, the annual cost of litter stuff is way, way lower than having to buy litter frequently.• Miss Kitty adapted to the new system right away. Fortunately, she’s never been picky when I’ve changed litter brands. I did a couple things for the first week to encourage her transition. I mixed a little regular litter in with the pellets for the familiar smell and feel. That shuffled out to the pee pad below over the week and then she was just left with the pellets. I put a couple old poops from the used litter in the new box, again to bring a familiar scent to the new system. And I left her old box out too for a week, but I left the used litter in there to discourage use of it. She was a little unsure the first evening, but after the first use, she never went back in her old box.• For people who are disabled/limited by lifting weight, picking up a 7lbs bag of pellets is way more feasible than 20-40lbs of litter or a box of used litter.Cons:• The Tidy Cats pellets and pads are pricey. That said, they are worth it for how well and how long they work. Some reviews talk about washing the pellets to extend their lifespan. I tried it just once out of curiosity, using the pet enzyme cleaner and a thorough rinse. It’s just not worth the gross hassle so I never did it again. Tidy Cat must have a stranglehold on the pellets because I can’t find an off brand, and if I somehow do, they’re back ordered or “we don’t know if these will be available again.” I wouldn’t think zeolite (the mineral they’re made of) pellets would be hard to find a generic of, but I’ve yet to. Even the pet stores don’t have their own generic versions. I haven’t tried generic pee pads yet, but the Tidy Cat ones work so well I’m fine with paying a bit more.• The pellets can be noisy. Miss Kitty loves rustlin’ in the box and those hard pellets against hard plastic can be fairly loud. I think she paws at the litter more now because she’s trying to cover the poop but it pretty much sits on top of the pellets no matter what she does. We tried getting the equine pine pellets that are dirt cheap and supposed to break down once they’re wet. But Miss Kitty apparently loved shredding those so much she was spending extra time rustlin’. All we ended up with was a messy pile of pine powder that was too much to fit in the lower tray. We gave up after a week. So we’re back to the louder, more expensive Tidy Cat pellets, but the pros vastly outweigh the cons. We got used to the sound in about a week or two.• Stepping on a pellet with your heel can feel like stepping on a Lego. With all her rustlin’ Miss Kitty still kicks litter out of the box. We have a litter pad outside the box - the kind with sizable holes and two layers so it’s easy to clean up (got it on Amazon too) - and that really helps catch them, but there’s still usually a few in the vicinity. We just have to be on top of cleaning the loose ones up. Also pointing the box opening towards the wall instead of the walkway really helped. The tray can be flipped to open either way - same direction or opposite direction of the box opening.Never thought I’d be evangelizing cat litter, but here I am. TL;DR just get it. You won’t regret it.