iTouchless: Smarter Housewares

One of the stranger parts about technology is how little it has changed many of the kitchen and bathroom items that everyone uses. Of course, it doesn't make sense to have a battery operated fork, for the most part, but often even the materials themselves are not radically different than long ago. Your ancestors would probably recognize your garbage can, pepper mill, and so on, though they might be surprised at how they look or feel. But they might be fascinated by your ceramic kitchen knives- even classic, essential products do change.

iTouchless produces a variety of interesting items that shake things up a bit. We've been trying these out in our offices for the past month, and have come away generally impressed. The packaging and their website do not necessarily inspire confidence, but all three items we've been using have us convinced that it is possible to improve- or at least offer an alternative to- existing housewares in many categories.

We'll hit on the best first. The iTouchless Touchless Trashcan is more or less what it sounds like. No, it won't compress your trash, but it will sense when you are hovering nearby and trying to throw something away, magically open the lid, and then close it a few seconds later. It also works as a fun gag for folks who aren't aware of the function- we never tired of seeing the surprised looks on staffers faces as they jumped. We liked the size- thirteen gallons is about right for a decent sized garbage can- and the black and stainless steel design. Bags are fairly easy to take out, as well as replace, and unlike step-to-open cans, you aren't stressing out the can. We didn't love the fact that it requires four D batteries, which were not included. And there is an option to use an AC adapter instead, but it is also not included. Apparently the batteries should last under normal operation for about a year- and it's thus far worked surprisingly well, once you get used to the small pause when needing to throw something away. It would definitely be a bit overpriced at the MSRP of $180, but we found it for $70 on Amazon, making it totally reasonable.

Slightly less useful was the Automatic Soap Dispenser 2-Unit Value Pack. There was plenty to like about them, and they performed pretty admirably- easy to clean, a large reservoir, no dripping. But the batteries (4 AAA) felt a bit wasted here, when a regular hand soap pump is simple and easy and effective. The sensors worked fairly well, but not always consistently, and a first it was dispensing too much soap. But we noticed that you can change the settings, which was a nice feature, but we still found it dispensing a bit much even on the lowest setting. They do look classy, and work for dish soap in the kitchen or most any other similar purpose. And they are available individually as well. But a two-pack is a decent deal, running about $50.

Finally, perhaps the least necessary of all- the iTouchless EZ Hold Battery Powered Stainless Steel Pepper Mill / Sea Salt Grinder. It's fairly solid, though the button and some of the internals feel a bit cheap. You can adjust the grind from coarse to fine (with limited success), but the device takes a whopping six AAA batteries! It works reasonably well, but an old school pepper mill definitely looks and feels better than pressing a button and you definitely have less control on quantity. We saw it for only $30, which puts it solidly into easy gift territory, but we would probably recommend finding a nicer, better made mill for your salts and pepper.