Zippered vs Snap Binders

 

[VIDEO TRANSCRIPT]

Hello my friends, I hope you're doing well. In this video, I am going to do a comparison between Zippered Binders and Snap Binder for your planner. This video was requested by you in the comments. In this video, I'm going to show you several of each. To help do the comparison. I'm going to show you these three Zippered Binders. We have leather Zippered Binders, and Simulated Leather Binders here and I'm also going to show these three Snap Binder. I have a Leather Binder, a Simulated Leather Binder, and a binder that is a unique shape.

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So, let's start with a pro for the Zippered Binder. I did a poll on my social media and I asked my followers, “Which do you prefer; a Zippered Binder or a Snap Binder?” And by the way, they call this a Snap Binder because of the snap that you see right there. And some of the binders that are in this style do not snap. I've had ones with a magnetic closure. Sometimes there's like a slide in closure there. And some of these closures are elasticized. But for simplicity purposes for this video, I'm going to refer to all of those types of binders with this type of strap as a Snap Binder.

So, when I asked the question on my social media, “What do people prefer?” What do you think they said? Well, here was their answer. Actually, it was about a tie. About half of the people said that they preferred Zippered Binders and half of them said that they preferred Snap Binder and only a couple of them said that they preferred open binders.

Now open binders are just like this except they don't have the strap it just opens like a book but nothing to secure it.

So, one pro about Zippered Binders that is heard over and over again is that people feel that with Zippered Binders, nothing will fall out of their planner. So that is the biggest pro. I know when I am traveling. If I want to take my binder with me, I always kind of reach for the Zippered Binder first because my binders are going to go in my luggage and I don't want anything to slip out. So that depends on your planning. Do you have a lot of small items or things that can slip out? A Zippered Binder might be for you.

I used to think like a lot of people that Zippered Binders were better. However, once I started trying Snap Binder, my mind changed. Nothing slipped out of the binder. Everything is secure. So, I guess it really depends on what you are carrying in your binder. If you have little small decorations that could slip out, I suppose you could say that a separate binder is better for you but I don't see the difference. I personally feel that they both secure your items equally.

So, now let's talk about a pro of the Snap Binder. The Snap Binder come in more colors and options. If you look on a Franklin Planner Website, for example, you will see these in a lot more different material. A lot more different colors is just more exciting to buy a Snap Binder. If you like a lot of options for your planner binder then the Snap Binder is the way to go because there are less options in my opinion in the zippered form.

Now the open binder doesn't have a strap at all, I would recommend those binders for people that keep their planner on their desk because I know when I slipped my binders and my tote bag if I didn't have the strap on them, they would kind of fall open like this. So that is a disadvantage of an open binder which again I opened binders one that don't have the strap it could just fall open in your tote bag or in your backpack and then I've had where a piece of gum or something will get stuck in your planner and then it can just feel unorganized. So, I prefer to have something securing my binder shut like a zipper or snap.

So, one disadvantage of a Zippered Binder is that it could make noise when you are unzipping it. So, listen to this. Now that wasn't that bad. But if you are in a quiet setting, like if you are in a meeting or at a library or somewhere where you need to be really quiet that may bother some people, the noise of opening your Zippered Binder. So, if you get a separate binder, I think it's important to get a good quality binder with a zipper that runs very smoothly. The last thing you want is a Zippered Binder that gets stuck when you're trying to open it. This is called the Tyler binder. By the way, this antique gold zipper zips very well and smoothly.

So, this is the Alex binder. And the zipper works pretty well on this one. Also, the Alex binder is a Leather Binder and the reason why I wanted to show it in this video is that it has a smaller footprint than the Tyler. So, the Tyler if you can see here is taller. If you line these up at the bottom, the Tyler is bigger here but they're about the same width. So, if you want to see a footprint binder you want to check the measurements before you purchase the binder, especially the height and width to make sure that it is a binder that is portable for you. I personally find that the taller binder is a little bulky for portability. And I'd rather have a smaller binder like this. But there's a disadvantage to a binder like this that I'm going to get to in a moment.

So, I also, I'm going to show you a Simulated Zippered Binder. So, let's listen to the zipper with this binder. So that's how it sounds. I believe this binder is called the Cody binder. And this binder feels a lot lighter because it is not leather.

So, I want to continue talking about the Zippered Binder. Another disadvantage of a Zippered Binder, well at least a misconception I think that some people think is that the zipper could be scratchy. So let me show you what I mean by that. So, when you open your Zippered Binder, and you're ready to write in your binder, some people say that the binder zipper feels scratchy. Now this one feels pretty smooth to me. It doesn't scratch my hand. Again, it's important to get a good quality binder. If you get a less quality binder. I'm pretty sure that the zipper could possibly feel scratchy as you're writing and then it could scratch your hands. I'm just going to quickly check if these other zippers feel scratchy. No, not in my opinion. This is again the Alex binder which is leather. And this is the Cody binder, which is Simulated leather and zippers do not feel scratchy to me on any of these binders. Now, of course with a Snap Binder, you don't have to worry about anything scratching your hand as far as a zipper is concerned.

Now one pro of a Snap Binder that a lot of people don't talk about but it is a pro is that if you'd like to put decoration in your planner, then a Snap Binder might be the way to go. If you want to put a cute little clip or dangly on your binder, you can just do it like that. And you'll see like the cute little planner clip hanging out on your binder and it looks so cute. But that's something that of course if you had a Zippered Binder, you cannot do. Another example of a decoration that you can do with a Snap Binder that you can't do with a separate binder. By the way this is called the Alex binder. It is a very well quality made Leather Binder. I highly recommend it. And this is a beautiful life binder in the color black. This is Simulated leather.

So, an example of a little dangly decoration is this right here. This is so cute. It has a little fox on it. So, some people like to decorate their planners with these cute little dangly things and a Snap Binder is perfect for that because you can buy danglies that are long that you can snap on to the last spring here and it will kind of like hang out your binder like this and it looks really cute though. If you like those types of planter decorations then the Snap Binder might be best for you 

Now another point I want to make about Zippered Binders versus Snap Binder is that you want to pay attention to the measurements on the site. This is a leather Zippered Binder that is longer than this leather Snap Binder. But not all Zippered Binders are bigger. This is a Simulated leather Covey binder and as you can see the Tyler is still bigger. So let me show you a con of a Zippered Binder that most people don't think of. Here is a con of some Zippered Binders. Zippered Binders in general are great for side tabs. Here's an example of side tabs. If you have side tabs you should be okay with the Zippered Binder because notice when I close this binder even though the footprint of this Leather Binder is smaller than the Tyler binder, the side tabs are fine in this binder, they don't hit against the zipper and intern brand your tabs you don't want to bend your tabs and the same thing with the Tyler binder. The tabs don't hit against the zipper at all. There's plenty of space between the tabs in the zipper. However, if you're the type of person that likes top tabs, here's an example of some top tabs top tabs could be a problem with some Zippered Binders dependent on their footprint. So, if you have some fragile top tabs, they're going to bend the tabs. You will have to be really careful with it. It's like right at the edge of the binder. So that's something to keep in mind.

I'm going to put these in a Tyler I don't think you're going to have that problem because the Tyler is taller and as you can see with these top tabs they fit fine because the Tyler is a taller binder. So, you want to pay attention to the measurements if you use top tabs in your planner. 

The one binder I didn't show you much in this video and I did a separate video on all of these binders. I will put a playlist at the end of this video. Click on the videos on the pink screen at the end if you want to see them. This is called the macro wrong Simulated leather Snap Binder I didn't see on a website where they are still selling as binder but they have a similar Chevron binder that they're selling. Now that's really cute and it has the same footprint as you see here. Now if you're really a minimalist, this is something that you might be interested in. This has a very small footprint. As you can see, it is nice as wide as [this is a beautiful life binder] is not as wide as their typical Snap Binder but it's almost the same height. I got this binder to travel with. I would probably prefers a separate one but I just wanted something real slim to travel with and this fits the bill.

Another important thing you want to look at when you're considering which binder to buy is the planter rings. Now the rings on this binder are small; it's under an inch and the rings on this are .12 inches. The ring size that you get depends on the type of planner you get and what you plan to put in your binder. If you have a weekly planner that means a planner with just monthly pages and weekly pages no daily pages no day on one page or day on to page just a weekly planner they come in horizontal format and vertical format. If you get a weekly planner, you can get away with smaller rings. I think 1.25-inch rings are fine provided that you don't put a whole bunch of extra pages in your planner in a zip version. And in the snap version, you can get different sized planner rings.

Now I'm going to show you an example of a ring size that is great for people that have daily planners if you had the day on two-page planner, or you have a planner that is a day on one page, I feel the one and a half inch rings are the best that gives you enough room to put a few months of planner pages in your binder and plus a few additional pages and tabs and so on and so forth.

So that pretty much sums up my pros and cons of Zippered Binders versus Snap Binder. Is there a pro or con here that you think I left out? If so, please be sure to put it in the comments because people watch these videos and they are looking for ideas and you may think of a pro or con that I didn't think of so feel free to leave a comment on this video. Or if you don't want to comment on this you can comment on anything planner related. I just love talking to you guys about planners. Please don't forget to like this video. This is Tonya, helping you feel more organized so this can be your best year yet. Take care.