product review: Scotch ATG 700

Ok, so I'm a sucker for the "latest and greatest"... a sucker for what is "hot"... a sucker for cool scrapbooking tools...

Somehow during my frequent visits to the Two Peas messageboards, I kept coming across posts about "ATGs"... So I read up on them... researched them... told myself not to give in to the hype...

As with all the big scrapbooking purchases I've made - I knew...

Must...not...give...in...to...the...hype...

Yeah. Riiiight.

I was weak. I caved in. And I ordered it from here - which was the cheapest place I could find it (including eBay.)I've had it for about a week and I'm finally able to give a review...

The pros:
- It's sturdy and big. It doesn't get lost on my desk during one of my scrapbooking tornadoes... Although I HAVE been known to still pat down the desk to look for it.
- If I were to take it to crops - I'd know it's mine since it's so big. *lol*
- The adhesive is super strong.
- Adhesive refills are cheaper (if you compare foot for foot with the other adhesives out there.
- One roll of adhesive lasts a while. I got myself a 60 yd roll - that is going to take a while to go through.
- Adhering a 12x12 piece of paper to another is super easy.

The cons:
- It has a distinct smell of adhesive.
- It wasn't cheap.
- It's pretty big. You can't use it for small embellishments.
- If you're not careful, you can gum up the rollers with the adhesive if you go too fast or release pressure on the trigger at a weird time.
- The instructions to load it are crappy - my hubby had to load it for me and I can see him refilling the ATG every time I need more adhesive!

Bottomline:
So far, so good. I really like it. Sure it was a big purchase, but I think it's worth it when I actually do the breakdown of yardage of adhesive... It'll pay off itself in a few months. Like I've said before, I've gone through TONS of different types of adhesive... This is now one of my favorites...

One word of advice if you're thinking about purchasing...
Think about what size width of adhesive you'll want to use... I chose the Scotch ATG 700 with the 1/2inch adhesive... I figured I could interchange with the 1/4inch rolls if I bought the adaptor (which I did)... BUT I wasn't thinking about how it wouldn't be possible to interchange sizes once you have one size loaded... If I had to do it all over again, I probably would go for the 1/4inch ATG - the 714. Alternating whole rolls just seems like a waste to me now. Oh well...

Oh and if you do choose to get an ATG, go with the "gold" rolls... Those are the ones that are guaranteed to be acid free. :)

Have a great week!