For new parents, you soon realise that the bottle sterilisers are "a sell" on you as new parents. They prey on your insecurities and vulnerabilities for your first born. The "you need to get this machine or you're a bad parent" vibes thrown your direction until you cave in and buy it. Second baby onwards, you know a good wash with soap and water works just the same and doesn't cost anything near the steriliser costs.
Hmm, I think it's true that certain products are a bit of a gimmick / preying on insecurities but I wouldn't class the steriliser or the bottle prep machine in that category. It's more about the fact that you're tired, making 5 or 6 bottles a day especially at the start (if formula feeding) and just don't have time to hand wash the bottles, or stand about waiting for the kettle to boil and then the annoying dance of trying to get the formula to the right temperature etc. on zero sleep for days at 3 in the morning...
Neither gadgets were particularly expensive and since we used them every day for the entire first year it felt like money well spent, have put them in the loft ready for another full year of use if/when we have another little one. Not trying to be overly defensive here just my own take on it
What would I class as preying on insecurities? Those "smart sock" or "smart sleep suit" things that claim to be able to accurately detect changes in the baby's breathing or heartrate or whatever to give you an alarm at night if something bad happens. Not to be dismissive of what must be the worst thing anyone could ever go through - but I feel like if you end up in a SIDS situation those monitoring things are going to do absolutely nothing to change the outcome, and yet I expect they probably do go off as false alarms a lot, making you even more panicked then you must already have been to buy them in the first place