The Ultra-Light Cooler I Swear By As A Caterer In Hawaii

A white RTIC cooler.

Living in Hawaii, I spend a remarkable amount of time negotiating with the sun.

Every grocery errand, beach trip, or lunch run requires some kind of cooler, if I want any hope of returning home without spoiled milk. And with my recent catering side gig, I’ve needed a cooler that can keep food fresh for hours as I traverse the fickle traffic patterns of Oahu’s north shore. Thankfully, I’ve found a trusted sidekick in the RTIC 52 QT Ultra-Light Cooler, which is now our pick for best hard cooler in our guide to the best coolers.

As I hauled dinners through the beating sun from Waialua to Laie, it occurred to me that the cooler giants of yesteryear are fading. In retrospect, the signs were obvious.

Brands like Igloo and Coleman, which popularized the personal cooler in the mid-’50s, have been in decline for nearly two decades now (though both brands still make coolers we recommend in our guide).

This is not an unfamiliar cycle: A trusted legacy brand defines an era and then slowly, sometimes subtly, makes compromises to its designs, shaving away pennies in expense and fractions in performance until there’s no more hiding the truth—that things no longer work like they used to.

Top pick

Better insulated and less expensive than the competition, this hard cooler keeps things ice cold for five days, and the well-designed drain ports make it easy to clean.



from Wirecutter: Reviews for the Real World https://ift.tt/A0hZQtm
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