"Ok I'm ready to do this! What juicer should I buy??"
Of course it's always followed with either 5, or 500 different suggestions which narrows down the posters question to pretty much almost everything which helps them not at all, or to just a few which doesn't help them either since they might not be in their price range or possibly not the best in their price range.
Now, I'm not going to tell you that you should in fact buy THIS ONE or THAT ONE, but I AM going to give you some tips on how I chose mine. I'm sure some of you are going to just wave your and poo-poo this whole post because it's all "duuuh" info. for you and that is absolutely fine. On the other hand, some of you may be like me and think,
"Holy cow...there are hundreds if not thousands out there. Which one do I chose? Is that really the best price? Is faster better? What's the difference between that one and this one? Why is there a monkey riding a scooter on that one?!?!?!"
It can be pretty daunting and time consuming but fret not! You are not alone. Trust me. You are soooooo not alone.
TYPE
The first thing you need to know, is what type of juicer you want. They basically fall into 3 categories; masticating, centrifugal, and triturating.
Centrifugal is the most common one you'll see on the market and tends to be the more inexpensive of the 3. The centrifugal juicer will take the fruits and veggies and grind them into oblivion (or at least a good pulp) and then expel the juices out of a spout using high rpm's. Most of these that I've seen also are pulp-ejecting, which means the pulp and left over bits will be shoved out another shoot into a bin. The upside to this juicer is that it's fast and convenient and fairly easy to clean. The downside is that due to the high speeds the unit uses to extract the juice, the faster the oxidation (the chemical reaction between oxygen and what it comes in contact with i.e. an apple browning once cut). Faster oxidation means faster loss of vitamins and nutrients. I'm not saying an hour from now your juice is worthless, I'm just saying that an hour from now it's not going to be as potent as it was when you first juiced it.
The masticating juicer is pretty much what it says. It chews up whatever you put into it, breaks it down, and then expels it. The bonus of a masticating machine is that they not only provide more fiber and enzymes, but also can homogenize what you put in it so you have the potential to also make stuff like sauces, ice cream, and even baby food. Some even come with attachments for grinding wheat and the like. Multipurpose is so win/win to me. Bonus: oxidation is going to be a bit slower with this one. Downside: the price is going to go up. Typically into the $200+ range.
The last option is the triturating. I can't say I know a WHOLE lot about this one, but from what I read, this is a two step, twin gear machine that first breaks up what you put in it, and then presses the juice out. It takes longer to use since it runs at a much slower rpm, but it also gives you the best possible juices packed with fiber and enzymes and vitamins AND they can somehow slow down the oxidation process of your juice. Something about bio-ceramic and magnets...I don't know. I'm just going to go with IT'S MAGIC! WEE! These machines are going to run you somewhere in the $500-$1,000 and up range. Are they worth it? I would say yes definitely in the long run. Would I buy one? No. I have bills to pay, 3 kids, and one income. Maybe when we're empty nesters....
PRICE
This is typically the main concern with anyone who's looking for a juicer. You can spend anywhere from $25 to $2,500.00 (and up!) on a juicer. Believe it or not, those high priced ones aren't even necessarily commercial use ones! They're just the "luxury liner cruise ship room with balcony, full maid service, complimentary champagne and chocolates, and dry cleaning service" versions. Frankly for that price I'd rather have the cruise, but that's just me.
So, best place to start that I've found? Amazon. No, I don't work for Amazon, nor am I affiliated with them in any way shape or form other than I shop there from time to time. The truth is they tend to have the widest selection of almost anything, AND they have customer reviews. That's the key to this whole thing right there. Now in my paranoid mind, I'm pretty sure it's possible that some of those people are paid to give good reviews of items, but then again, there are tons of people like me out there who just like to help others be more informed and give their honest opinions about a product they like/don't like as well. So here we go.
Run a search for 'juicers'.
From there, you're going to see a section on the left under 'kitchen and dining' that is called, surprise, 'juicers'. Click on that.
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Scroll down a bit and you're going to see the price section which is wonderfully broken down
for you on many levels. For the sake of ease, let's go ahead and look at
$25-$50.
Right off the bat we have 5 pages of options. A key thing to note here, is what kind of juicer each one is. The standard is a either a juice extractor, or a citrus juicer. Unless you're looking to go on a citrus only diet (I'm not entirely sure that would be the best idea...just saying..), make sure what you are looking at is a juice extractor. I can't tell you how many times I got excited thinking I'd found a juicer with great reviews at a great price and then saw 'citrus juicer' in the title. Doh.
From here, you have options. You can either peruse at your leisure or you can organize your options a different way. If you opt to peruse, I would recommend opening any possibility in a new window/tab (right click the item and select 'open in new window(or) tab') I'm a tab person myself. It's easier to just click along tabs at the top of my browser rather than sift through a bunch of windows at the bottom of my screen. Personal preference.
If you opt to organize, in the top right you'll see a pull down menu that says 'sort by'. Just click on that little arrow and choose your adventure. Personally I go with 'average customer review'. I'm in my price range, so my next concern is what John or Jane Doe thinks of this product.
Next I'm going to start looking at those stars under each item. As I said, I like to buy things that have a good review/reputation. It's entirely possible that some of these machines are absolutely fantastic, but just haven't been reviewed yet. If you feel you're a risk taker, then by all means include them in your new tabs/windows. Myself, I prefer to go with reviewed items since I feel the risk of buying a dud is a lot lower.
Another thing to keep in mind here, is number of stars in direct correlation to number of reviews. A juicer with a 5 star rating is awesome, but if there's only 2 reviews, that doesn't say much compared to a juicer that has a 4 star rating and 148 reviews. My first action was to do a quick once over and open in a new tab any juice extractor that had a 4 or more star rating AND at least 30-40 + reviews. Use your own best judgement, these are just the typical numbers I went with. If this only resulted in maybe 2 or 3 options, I would then lower my number of reviews to maybe 20-30. If I were absolutely SET in my price range, these would be the choices I would go with. Otherwise, my next step would be to see what the next price range up had to offer.
From there I start narrowing down my options more so by reading through reviews. One of the most important things to me was the pulp. How wet or dry was it coming out? Wet pulp means there's a lot of juice being lost there. Really dry pulp means I'm getting the most juice possible. Be warned though, that dryer pulp usually means higher RPM which means what kids? Yes, faster oxidation. Being a stay-at-home mom, I was ok with this since I knew I'd be drinking my juice right away. Next, how many people gave it 1 star? 2 stars? What is the ratio of bad reviews to good reviews? What was the common complaint among most the reviews? Is that something I can deal with if overall it's a good machine? Did anyone contact customer service and how did that go? If I need to buy replacement parts, what am I looking at spending? What is the most common praise among all the reviews?
Don't let the bad reviews scare you off. When a company makes thousands of machines at a time, there's always going to be a number of them that are duds. Check over the provided info. carefully to see if there's a warranty on the product, and if possible, what it covers. Don't be afraid to call or email the company and ask them questions. Next see how long before people complained. If there's a 1 year warranty on a product, and most people said something broke in the first 3 months, then you can probably be somewhat assured that if you get a dud, there's at least a warranty to cover it.
One juicer I saw, the common complaint was that there was some leaking at the bottom somehow. Some people really dwelled a lot on that fact and gave the product a poor review, while a majority of others said that yes, there was leaking, but it was such a small amount it wasn't a big deal. I can say right now that mine doesn't leak but I make a small mess anyway with washed produce sitting next to my machine that I have to usually wipe up a bit after anyway, so a bit of leaking wouldn't bother me hardly at all.
Once you've narrowed your options down to a more reasonable amount, look up websites, or call various kitchen providing stores in your area. For me it was Bed, Bath, and Beyond, Walmart, and Best Buy. I pulled up their websites along with a search engine (in case another site might have it), and ran a search for the exact name of the juicer I saw on Amazon. You're now going to price compare. Honestly, 9 out of 10 times, Amazon had it cheaper. HOWEVER, don't forget to calculate shipping costs. My family has an Amazon Prime membership. This entitles us to free 2 days shipping, and super cheap next day shipping. Also keep in mind that COUPONS ARE YOUR FRIEND. My Bed, Bath, and Beyond sends out a monthly coupon for a certain amount or % off your total. In one instance, one juicer I had narrowed down to would have been cheaper if I bought it from the brick and mortar BB&B rather than order it next day shipping from Amazon. Lastly, BE SURE YOU CALL THE BRICK AND MORTAR STORE AND MAKE SURE THE ITEM IS IN STOCK. Websites will give you an idea if they carry it, but they're not always spot on for product availability.
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So that's it! Yes I know,
/sarcasm "Oh..is THAT all? This'll be a cinch..."/end sarcasm
I never said this was an easy and fast process. If you want easy and fast, hit up websites or forums and just take what is offered. Personally I researched through my options for at least 2 days before settling on one for myself that was a good balance of price and customer satisfaction. If you're interested I went with this one (the price of which has gone up $5 since) I've owned it for about 3 weeks and use it at least twice a day and have no complaints yet. I haven't left a review since some of the negative ones all seem to take place after a few months of use. At one month I figure I'll go write a review, and if anything changes, go back and edit it.
I hope this helps you in your search for the right juicer for you. By all means if you have any questions or comments, please feel free to do so. At this time I'm monitoring all comments since I keep getting comment spammed by some Russian comment bot or something *eye roll*, rest assured though that so long as you're on topic (or near to), it will go through.
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