Salt and pepper mill fail

Normally, we’re happy to recommend products and home ideas to you, but on this occasion, we’re not.

Although these mini magnetic salt and pepper mills look compact, easy to use and quite sweet (the handles look like bunny ears and the two small dots on the ball look a bit like eyes) their design has major faults.

The black handles at the top are designed to be squeezed, which releases the salt or pepper from the bottom of the mill. But, from our experience, they break ever so easily and are not robust enough.

We’ve got through a couple of them. With the first pepper one we had, it lasted about six months before one handle snapped off mid use, quickly followed by the same breakage on the salt handle.

Giving it the benefit of the doubt, we thought perhaps it may have been over used or squeezed too hard, so we replaced them.

The second pepper lasted a matter of weeks – with very gentle, occasional use – before that too broke in exactly the same way. It could be a concidence, but it seems others have experienced the same problem.

As salt and pepper mills go, they’re cheap and quirky (the magnetic bit on the back means you can hang them on your fridge, if you so desire, or join them together), but for durability and long-term value for money, they fail completely.