When I got this as a shower gift I thought it was a great idea, but after I had to change the bag a few times I quickly changed my mind. It's not completely smell-proof and it fills up extremely fast. Having to buy special bags is obviously a pain, especially when they're not exactly easy to locate. The top mechanism is difficult to put back together when changing the refill. I think I've only gotten it right once and I've used this thing for over a year. Changing the bag takes too long so it usually goes undone and I end up using a standard pail anyway. The diaper genie prevents smells better than a standard waste pail would, but if I hadn't gotten it as a gift, I would have trashed it long ago and replaced it with a diaper disposal system that, at the very least, uses standard trash bags.