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VitaMix vs BlendTec


Robyn Openshaw - May 18, 2008 - This Post May Contain Affiliate Links


robyn fixing a vitamix

So I came in from running and started to make a blenderful of GS.   Sometimes if my BlendTec is full of something else, or my kids put the container somewhere that I can’t find, I use the VitaMix instead of the BlendTec.

This photo  shows  another reason  why I promote BlendTec over VitaMix.   This is the third time this has happened to me in the past few years with my VitaMix:  while blending, for no good reason, the entire base and blade assembly comes apart from the container.   I had to pull the container off the base and quickly dump it into my other container (losing some all over the counter in the process).   I had to stick my hand into the container of green goo and fish  out the blade assembly.

So I told my son to grab the camera so you could at least be entertained by it.   Don’t get me wrong–VM is a good machine, makes awesome smoothies, and they honor their warranty well (I’ve burned up a couple of their machines).   But you can read my 6 reasons (besides this design flaw) why I choose to promote BlendTec, by clicking here.

Posted in: Green Smoothies, Tools & Products

15 thoughts on “VitaMix vs BlendTec”

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  1. Anonymous says:

    hee hee. I wasn’t even aware that the blades could come off like that. I borrowed a VitaMix so that I could compare it to my Bosch blender. I can’t tell any difference with the green smoothies, but the hot pink smoothie is ot as smooth, and the blades almost always try to come off when I throw in the frozen strawberries. Also, I would guess that the motor of the Bosch may not last as long, and then I might have ruined my breadmaker, food processor, and wheat grinder at the same time.

  2. Oh our dear Robyn —— you seem to be turning into the hulk!!! LOL Thanks for sharing. Atleast when my last cheapy blender cracked apart in the base I didn’t have to go on a treasure hunt for blades in the depths of the green goo 🙂

  3. http:// says:

    Ooh, the Bosch. I have that one, too. The blades don’t stay sharp long and eventually make seriously yucky, undrinkable green smoothies. And yeah, I burned up the motor and had to have it rebuilt, trying to blend frozen fruit.

    I should say that I was able to put my VM container back together, THIS time, screwing the blade assembly and base and container all together. I guess I need to check more often to see if they’ve come loose. Other times, though, it has actually BROKEN out of the plastic in the base of the container, and VM has had to replace it. The design flaw seems to be that the metal base/blades are too heavy for the plastic in the bottom, which breaks away.

  4. Anonymous says:

    Robin, your house looks so clean! How do you do it?

  5. http:// says:

    My house was clean until the VM blew up. 😉

    And, at first I thought I was getting the the Incredible Hulk as a compliment because of my ripped muscles, but no . . . you meant because my hand is covered with green!

  6. Robyn, I just wanted to introduce myself and say what an inspiration you’ve been to me. I found your site through Live Lightly Tour. My family and I have been drinking green smoothies daily for over a month now. I won’t go into all the specifics, but the health benefits have been impressive to say the least. And this is from someone who thought they had a pretty healthy diet before!

    I also got your basic recipe collection and have made several things and we love it. Oh, and the quinoa (protein) cookies? I tweaked that recipe to add whole oats, cinnamon and raisins. It tastes like an oatmeal raisin cookie!

    I was concerned about the money at first. I’m pretty frugal by nature and the weekly cost of making the smoothies seemed staggering. But after a couple of weeks, I noticed that I wasn’t spending any more money for groceries…and was perhaps spending less? So, because I’m me, I had to do a cost analysis. Long story short? We’re *saving* appr. $58 a month by drinking green smoothies.

    I couldn’t believe it! Who would have thought that possible? The cost analysis can be found here:

    http://glorious-mayhem.blogspot.com/2008/05/green-smoothie-cost-breakdown.html

    if anyone is interested. 🙂

    I’d love to hear how much it costs others in other parts of the country/other grocery stores etc. And also any tips on saving even more while improving our health.

    Thanks again for the website.

  7. http:// says:

    Hi Michelle, and welcome! I’m always glad to hear when people aren’t spending more while providing great nutrition, and even better when they’re spending LESS! What’s the Live Lightly Tour? You should post your version of quinoa cookies on the site. 🙂

    Robyn

  8. Hi Robyn,

    I totally agree with your assessment and sold my Vitamix on Craigslist to get some money toward a BlendTec. Couldn’t be happier. I’ve never experienced issues with the Vitamix assembly, but the tamper is required for so much of the blending I do and the smoothies – among other recipes – just weren’t all that smooth. I also found that the Vitamix splashed ingredients all over the lid every time I started it. No such concerns with the Blendtec – super smooth, no eruptions. Thanks for your blog – good stuff!

  9. Hi Robyn, thanks for the welcome. 🙂 It took me forever to figure out how I found you. The Live Lightly Tour is this sweet family that are touring in an RV powered by vegetable oil. The website is:

    http://www.livelightlytour.com/page/1/

    But for the life of me, I couldn’t figure out how I found YOU there. Then I remembered that the mom has a website called Happy Foody and I found you through her here:

    http://happyfoody.com/2008/03/15/how-to-make-a-green-smoothie/

    As far as my recipe on the quinoa cookies, I truly took your recipe and added 1 cup of rolled oats, 1 t cinnamon and 1/4-1/2 cup raisins. I’ve got pictures of them on my blog if anyone is interested. I deliberately leave some of the wheat in a more “cracked” stage and it gives the cookies this terrific texture.

    http://glorious-mayhem.blogspot.com/2008/05/quinoa-protein-cookies.html

  10. Hi Robyn!

    Thanks for posting this with the photo too! I’ve linked to it from my site. I run a raw vegan culinary studio in Singapore and we have both Blendtecs and Vitamixes. Everyone who has used both at the studio invariably prefers the Blendtec! Glad you didn’t get hurt when the assembly came apart – always a fear when the machines going at full power.

  11. http:// says:

    I was just in Singapore–what a beautiful place you live in! Organized, clean, beautiful. Wish I’d known you had a raw studio and could have visited.

  12. Anonymous says:

    Hello Robyn – Thanks for the heads-up on the Vitamix. I was really torn between the Vitamix vs Blendtec, but the 7 year warranty on the Blendtec seems worthless since they count cycles, and when you hit 10,000, your warranty is up. And Blentec container only has a 1 year warranty, so when it begins to leak, time to buy a new container (and blade). So just comparing warranties, Vitamix is far superior since they cover every thing for 7 years excluding the tamper. The Blendtec rep misrepresented the warranty at the demo making it sound like their warranty was even better than Vitamix due to the lifetime warranty on the blade and coupling. After reading the fine print, I am very disappointed that Blendtec is not up front with their warranty and leaves out the cycle counter – a glaring omission. And there is some thing very disturbing, at least to me, about a warranty that attempts to track the usage using a counter. I really get the impression that Blendtec is unable to really stand behind the durability of their blender over 7 years, but it sounds like you have had excellent results with Blendtec. BTW, your cycle count must be off the charts.

  13. Anonymous says:

    I don’t get it. I’ve loved my Vita-Mix for YEARS and everyone I know does, too. I’ve heard that the Blendtec just isn’t the workhorse that Vita-Mix is. Robyn, is Blendtec paying you to be a promoter?

  14. Anonymous says:

    Allison, are you saying that Robyn faked the picture to make a sale? I don’t think she would do that. Remember my favorite quote – “the plural of anecdote is not data” 😀 Just because this has never happened to your blender doesn’t mean it can’t happen.

  15. Anonymous says:

    Just wanted to include a retraction to my previous post regarding the Blendtec warranty. I was told by a rep from Blendtec that the 7 year warrany also increases the cycle count to 20,000. After using the Blendtec for a while, I realize that even under heavy home use, you are unlikely to reach the 20,000 cycle limit in 7 years. Even though I would often need to run through several cycles to make one smoothie, using the manual cycle to add more time or clean the machine did not increase the cycle count.

    So I gave both machines a work out for about a month trying different recipes. Having taken the warranty off the table in the decision process, I was ready to buy which ever one I liked better. As Robyn mentions, they are both great machines, and I would not mind having one of each. But I had to choose one, and the Vitamix was the winner for me. The main reason was that I could make recipes much faster in the Vitamix primarily due to the tamper. For instance, when I made hummus, I was able to crank that recipe out on the VM in about a minute while it took me over 5 minutes with the Blentec. The tamper is a necessity when blending thick mixtures. With the Blendtec, all I could do is let the machine run for a few seconds, take the lid of and shove the ingredient into the blade, put the lid back on, and repeat over and over and over again. I made a very nice frozen dessert in the VM using frozen fruit, some ice, and tofu which would have been impossible with the BT without adding water and making a more runny dessert. Even getting smoothies to start blending was much more difficult with the BT where as the VM tamper always got thing going in a matter of seconds. I was much more efficient using the VM and the tamper.

    I did like BTech’s square container and single blade which made getting thick mixtures out easier. And I like idea of more power. But in the end, the VM was just easier to use, was more efficient, and seemd to do a wider array of things from chopping using the slow variable speed setting to quickly making smoothies using the tamper to get things blending in a matter of second regardless of the type and order of ingredients.

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