Care/Of Subscription Box Review + Coupon – September 2017

Care/of is a personalized vitamin and supplement subscription. You can choose individual items a la carte or take a quiz to personalize your Care/of packets. Possibilities include vitamins, minerals, probiotics, Ayurvedic herbs, and more.

This box was sent to us at no cost for review. (Check out the review process post to learn more about how we review boxes.)

The Subscription Box: Care/of

The Cost: Varies depending on the vitamins you select. Each vitamin is priced individually and start at $5/month. 

The Products: Vitamins, minerals, and other supplements. You can elect to take a quiz and have Care/of select products for you (you can edit what they choose) or you can pick your own supplements.

Ships to: U.S. (free if your total is over $20)

Check out all of our Care/Of reviews and more supplement subscription boxes in the Fitness Subscription Box Directory!

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Several cards were in the box. One was personalized with my name and there were also Supplement Facts sheets for the items I chose.

You get 30 packets and you take the contents of one packet each day. I changed up my selections from last time so you could see something different. I decided to keep it simple this month and pick supplements of types I already take.

I chose the following:

Veggie Omega – Value $18/Month

I was excited to see Care/of came out with this product. I’ve been a vegetarian for 24 years so fish oil is out of the question.

This is also vegan/vegetarian and you take two per day. This provides DHA and EPA (these are the active forms in the body and are not found in most plant sources of omega-3 fatty acids such as flax) from microalgae and is free of fish and shellfish, so it is an omega-3 option for people with allergies. I’ve been taking omega-3 fatty acid supplements for years; once I had a high cholesterol diagnosis due to triglycerides and taking omega-3s was part of my strategy to get that down. (It worked, I have great cholesterol now.) These don’t have any sort of aftertaste or smell.

I’m probably not going to run out and get a cholesterol test at the end of the month to see how I’m doing…anyway, this is also supposed to be good for the brain, eyes, hearts, and joints, and is especially important to take if you don’t eat fish.

Multivitamin – Value $15/month

You take one tablet of this a day. It is vegetarian (vegan, actually) and gluten free as well as being free of all the major allergens. It has a bit of a vitamin smell but nothing too bad. It is a pretty average size for a multivitamin and includes a handful of minerals (no iron, though) and some plant extracts including ginger and turmeric, which are good for inflammation. This isn’t really the kind of product I take to get a noticeable benefit, but rather to supplement my diet in case I am low on anything.

Verdict: I did not calculate a value for Care/of because it is so individualized. What one person selects might be completely different from what someone else selects. I like having specific information about sourcing and manufacture in one place, as well as links to resources about the supplements.

The package I received is sold for $33, with the cost breakdown shown next to the item names above. You can get more pills for less money per pill from other sources, like Swanson, if you stick to their private-label products, but you are paying a little for convenience here -- no need for pillboxes for travel, and you can just grab a packet and take it to work or wherever. Also, you're not stuck with 240 capsules of turmeric or something if you decide it's not for you; you can change what's in your packet for the next month. The other place you get added value is if you need help selecting supplements. Let's say you are worried about heart health due to family history but you don't know where to begin. The Care/of quiz can help guide you there.

Note: there aren’t really any private-label vegetarian omega-3 supplements out there yet, at least not last time I went looking, so the price on that one is a bit more competitive than with the multivitamin. (However, with a lot of multivitamins, the formula can change and suddenly include gelatin when it didn’t, previously, whereas that’s not an issue here.) So this particular selection of products may be especially beneficial to vegans and vegetarians and can take some of the hassle out of shopping for supplements.

What do you think of Care/of?