Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

This bin is a great value. It's simple, cheap, and it works. Frankly, it does not make much sense to spend over a hundred dollars for a bin, which is what most cost. The best alternative to this is to make a bin yourself out of wire fencing or hardware cloth, which I have heard works great and I almost did that myself before settling on this. This is more convenient and more attractive, which matters if (like me) you don't have any place on your property to put it out of sight. It's also only barely more expensive than the DIY version. BUT -- this particular version, from this seller (My Green Gloves Dot Com) does NOT come with the stakes that are included in the slightly more expensive version offered by multiple sellers (including Amazon itself). If you want the stakes (and I would suggest that you do), go pay a few more bucks for the other one here: Presto Products GKL0951-6 Geobin Composting System Yes, you can go buy stakes are your local hardware or garden store, but you'll spend more than the difference between these two versions. UPDATE Jan 2013: It appears that the none of the Geobins ship with stakes anymore, though some folks may be selling old stock that still comes with stakes. But there's no guarantee that you'll get stakes if you buy via the link above. Anyway, it turns out that the stakes are not all that important -- I've found that once you get the thing nice and full, it stays put pretty well on its own. Now that my first one is full, I am going to be ordering a second one. UPDATE Feb 2014: Having owned two of these bins for over a year now, in continuous use, I can add to my original review the fact that they are really quite durable. I'd had some concerns initially, but they hold up pretty well. The plastic does get strained/stretched where you fasten it together, but it doesn't tear. Whenever I turn my compost, I unwrap it and reassemble it upside down and inside out relative to how it just was. This keeps the plastic from getting stretched in the same places all the time and keeps everything in shape. I don't know if they'll last forever, but at least another couple of years, if not more. Speaking of turning, don't waste your time with those plunge-type compost turners -- they don't really do much. If you want to turn your compost, get an ensilage fork (aka "pitchfork"), unwrap the Geobin from the pile (if your compost is sufficiently moist, it will hold its shape well enough even unwrapped), set it up right next to the pile, and fork the pile into the bin in its new location. A fork works much, much better than a shovel for this job. This is great exercise! It only needs to be done a few times for each batch of compost, until it no longer heats up after turning.