DVD Stripper

Picture Christmas Day. You and your family are sitting in the living room. Everyone is stuffed from the awesome dinner and exhausted from too many starches. Then, the little one comes over and wants you to open her brand new video. Grrr, you cannot even think about dealing with the stupid security tape and plastic wrap. Not to mention, your hands are cut from all the chopping and late night wrapping of Santa’s gifts. Here to make your life easier is Lori Power’s DVD Stripper.

Lori was tired of cutting herself and fumbling with the excessive wrappers on DVDs and CDs. She spent 3 years and countless dollars to invent this bright, aqua blue gadget. According to the DVD Stripper website, it takes just 2 seconds for the carbon encased blade to open new videos. The blade cuts right “through the shrink wrap, bar code foils and other tags the entertainment industry loves to wrap around their products.” So, does it really work and is it safe enough for anyone to use? Keep reading and find out!

The gadget is made of a thick, translucent plastic and measures approximately 8.75″ tall x 6.25″ wide x 1.25″ thick. On the top left edge, there is a switch nearly covering the first set of two carbon blades. At first glance, I was concerned over this blade. It appeared Alyssa (my daughter) could put her finger on the switch, and the blade would then pop up and slice her.

Lori knew this would be a concern for parents, and she established a safety feature to prevent the blade from extending. Along the backside of the DVD Stripper, there is another switch.

Without activating the second switch, the first blade cannot extend. It may appear you could just put your finger on this second protective switch, but you gotta have some mighty long fingers. The left edge of the stripper is long and thin, and Lori intentionally designed it to prevent easy access.

The second set of blades is along the middle of the stripper. It is basically a serrated knife that quickly punctures the plastic wrap.

Again, it looks like you could just put your fingers in there and slice them. Lori made that pretty tough, too. Here is a picture of me literally shoving my fingers in the device. It was a super tight fit.

On the website, the DVD Stripper is touted as being safe for even little ones. To prove this claim, I carefully had Alyssa and Ashley place their hands in the case. You can tell by this picture, their little hands cannot access the blade mechanism. Perfect!

So, how does this shiny blue gadget work? Thanks to their Auntie Morgan’s Target gift card, we purchased three shiny new DVDs. The girls selected their DVD.

As Ashley is showing, she simply placed the DVD inside the case. As the DVD slides through, the carbon blades are extended.

The blades quickly slice the security seal and wrapping. Ashley was unable to make it work on the first try. It took a little more strength to push the case in the stripper. Here to help demonstrate is her big sister Alyssa. On the first try, Alyssa forced her prized Barbie video in the DVD Stripper. Since there was wrapper on both sides, she flipped over the video and reinserted it.

Ashley followed this example, and then both girls were able to open their video. Here’s Ashley simply sliding her finger down the perforation. She then easily unwrapped the video.

Alyssa completed the demonstration by opening up the video. Pretty impressive that 3 and 4 years old could use this thing, right?

Here is a close-up of how the security tape split. A small piece extended on all three videos we opened. It made it easy to remove the security tape from the case.

Lori’s invention of the DVD Stripper was brilliant. Looking at the entertainment industry, there are a billion DVDs sold annually. Add to that, there are millions of people struck with arthritis, making it difficult to manipulate the dreaded security tape. The DVD Stripper is a perfect solution to quickly and effectively open a new DVD case. What a great Christmas gift idea, too!

A set with both a CD and DVD Stripper is available for $19.99.