So I have heard many times about Chatbooks on Instagram… from friends, other bloggers I follow. At first I was like- meh. I get pretty photobooks already from Shutterfly or Blurb and so I didn’t really pay much attention.
But for Christmas I wanted to send a Grandma photobook and decided to try something new and I am so glad I did!
So Chatbooks is nothing like a standard phonebook company. In a nutshell you build a little photobook from your Instagram account or Facebook or right from your camera roll on your phone!
If you decide to build one from social media- Facebook or IG- you can include the comment, hashtags, dates etc… from your original post. It is really so cool! Chatbooks even organizes your photos by date- so say you do a summer photobook with all your summer activities- it is put in the book in order by date so no need to try and remember when you did things and spend time putting everything in order.
I am amazing at taking the camera everywhere- in fact I bought myself a backpack photo bag for my birthday just because my husband complains about dragging the cumbersome camera bag 😉 What I am not amazing about it getting those photos off my computer and into photo books. So important to do and Chatbooks makes it so easy!
You can pull as many photos as you want from IG, Facebook, your camera roll, exclude ones you don’t want, change the captions– all right from the app on your phone.
And in the future to make it even simpler, you can set Chatbooks to automatically start photobooks for you from IG and once you fill the book (60 pages) they will notify you it is time to order. You can edit the book and boom- it is on the way!
So each book is only $8 and shipping is free. That is a softcover book and you can upgrade to hardcover if you prefer.
AND if you have groups or family members you can all get together and everyone contributes photos to the same book. That would be great for families, sports teams, charity events, Girl Scouts or special events like weddings.
Are you trying to keep up with the kids art? This would be a brilliant way to organize– just snap a nice photo of the art project and build a photobook of memories. On the spine of the book you can name the book- so Maya 2015 1st Grade Art or something would be fantastic!
So I want to note this is not a sponsored post- I just genuinely think this is a great idea for busy families to keep up on photo books.
Now the concept here is great but I did order my first chatbook and I want to be sure the size of the books is clear. They are a smaller size- they are 6×6. The one I ordered was the softcover for $8.
These are photos you aren’t directly uploading to their site so I found the photo quality not as crisp as with other photobook companies. So for sure that is a consideration. This won’t replace our annual photobooks where I have the very best highlights from the year. Those take me forever but they do turn out beautifully.
But without question I will continue to make these books regularly! When I scroll back through Instagram and Facebook I see so many fantastic memories throughout the years and it is such a shame to not have those day to day memories in books. After all life is about the little things not always the big moments.
And if you have teens I bet they would love this service! In fact I mentioned it in my teenager gift guide post recently.
My little girls (6 and 8) absolutely LOVE photobooks. They basically ripped our Chatbook from my hands the second I opened it and then there was a screaming, crying fight until I yelled to sit together and look at the same time. (No really). So make these for your little sports stars and ballerinas and spelling bee winners and I bet the kids feel so special and so important.
Next time I will invest in the hardcover for sure.
SO now for the important part. You can get your first book free by using referral code:
HAGJ2FNJ
Once you register and make your book, if you like the service and the product, share with your friends your own code and they will also get the first book free!
Head over to Chatbooks to take a look. Note this is an app so you can watch videos and how to’s and get inspiration from the web site but you want to design your books and such via the free app download.
Vanessa Quigley says
Thank you so much for the wonderful review of Chatbooks! I’m so glad you finally tried us out and are loving your books! Happy Holidays. 🙂
jamie says
I appreciate your honesty. So, many people promote things and it is hard to determine what is really GOOD anymore and TRUTH! What company do you use for your yearly books? May be I missed it? My children have yet to see a printed book or photo album, so i am determined to start now. A couple things hold me up. I don’t want all these random mismatched photo books from five different companies. And I have never sat down to look at all the options. I’ve seen some my friends did and they look cheap and cheezy. I want something clean and good quality.
Another thing holding me up, is I could never decide how to do it. One for each kid separately and/or with a family one too! Or just one family one and they can fight over them after I die? My son is 14 years old and my daughter is 7 years old. so, they are far apart in age. My mind thinks that it is kinda unfair to have 7 years of just my son and then my daughter never get any alone. See my dilemma?? sigh.
How do you do it? What works for you?
thanks!
Charlene says
Hi Jamie,
I just started with Blurb this year. I have wanted to use Blurb for awhile but they are a bit more expensive. I used to use Shutterfly but the prices are going up and the quality isn’t super IMO. I guess the way I look at it is that something is better than nothing, so I totally and completely get what you mean by good quality and matching books but at the end of day better to have something than nothing at all? I just do one family book for major vacations and one per year and then I do the cheaper and quicker chatbooks for special events and birthdays per kid. These Chatbooks are small so I would for sure not recommend as your annual family book but compiling birthday memories or just beautiful Instagram photos and stuff I love these small, inexpensive books.
Not sure if that helps or not– good luck with your photos!
I am rooting for you 🙂
Charlene