Online green retailer BayingHound contacted us last week to tell us about a SIGG return program they had launched to offer discounts for SIGG bottles folks wanted to exchange for alternative brands.

BayingHound has been offering 40% discounts on new water bottles if you return SIGG bottles to them, and are also offering a 20% discount to anyone using the code NOTASIGG. The offer is good through October 1, and they've taken out an ad in the ZRecs Guide to promote the offer, where many of our readers end up browsing when they're shopping for safer children's products.

Shop owner and mom (to a four-year-old) Rachel Tayse Baillieul started Baying Hound in 2006 "to promote eco conscious consumerism based on our desire to find safe goods for our daughter," and stocks her shop with a variety of greener products, including a wide range of stainless steel water bottles - Earthlust, Klean Kanteen, Thinksport, Nathan, Guyot Designs, Blue Q (a brand we hadn't even heard of!) - as well as the super-clever ceramic Not A Paper Cup.

BayingHound is the first paid advertiser in the ZRecs Guide, something we'd like to see more of to help offset our costs and provide some return on investment for the intensive research we do to maintain our directory.

We have another advertiser lined up for an ad to go up next week - in this case, bottle brand Thinksport, who also generously contributed five bottles in our latest newsletter giveaway, which subscribers can still enter until the end of the day. Our plan for advertising in the guide is to allow any brand selling products we consider to be safe, and any retailer who specializes in safer products, to advertise there.

More on that in a coming post. In the meantime, if you are interested in advertising in the ZRecs Guide for your product, brand, or online retail shop to reach a highly targeted group of consumers looking for immediate purchasing options for safer childrens' products, email us at zrecsmedia@gmail.com and we can provide advertising rates and ad specifications.

For all you shoppers out there who use the ZRecs Guide to help make online purchasing decisions, we encourage you to check out and consider BayingHound's offer. We appreciate their advertising business and see a boost in our direct-sold advertising as a key way to diversify and improve the income we see from ZRecs, which in turn can help make what we do possible over the longer term. It's also the best deal out there for swapping an old SIGG for a new water bottle if you're interested in trying another brand.