Graco Trekko Duo Tandem at Harrogate Nursery Fair 2012

These are photos of the new Graco Trekko Duo tandem pushchair. I must stress that this pushchair was a prototype and may well be different when finally produced.

The Trekko Duo is essentially a single 3 wheel pushchair with an add on second seat, called a Rumble Seat. As the photos show, the Rumble seat fits really neatly into the basket when not required, and the Trekko Duo folds up neatly with the Rumble seat inside. The Rumble seat was very easy to pop on and off – very easy!! The Rumble seat has an upright seat position and a recline, however it is only suitable from 6 months old. The lower seat reclines really easily by simply pulling the seat backwards and it releases and you can then move the seat. There was tons of room in the basket for small feet, plus space for a changing bag or shopping.

The Trekko Duo upper seat is huge. Our 3.5 year old is in age 4-5 clothing (102cms tall) and she had loads of leg room, head room and seat width, although the harness was nearly at full extension (but that is to be expected at her age). The swing away bumper bar was useful as she could climb into the seat on her own.

The Graco Trekko Duo has a really neat brake pedal where it gets flicked side ways on and off. I have to admit I thought I would struggle to locate it under the Rumble seat, and would end up hopping on one leg before falling over (!), but I had no issues with it. The adjustable handle seemed to be far enough away so that I didn’t kick the Rumble Seat. The classic Graco barrel fold was easy.

There are however two flaws. First of all the newborn options are limited on the Trekko Duo. I really wish pushchair manufacturers would realise that most mums of two dont hibernate for 6 months post birth – that they need a pushchair that will seat two children well.

Graco Trekko Duo can take a newborn in single mode in the upper seat, or a newborn in a car seat. We tried the car seat on top and although its not ideal for the lower child. there is plenty of head clearance and the lower rumble seat can sit upright with the car seat on. The upper seat can recline to flat, but the toddler needs to be reclined too. There was space for the first recline (of two) when my toddler was in the lower seat but the full flat recline would have been too near her face. But it may well not have been for a younger toddler, and would have been fine for a child who didn’t mind being reclined eg if you have small age gap.

The other flaw is the seating position of the upper seat. The upper seat recline is managed by buckles and as the photos show, the seat doesn’t really come upright enough for an older toddler. Our 20 month old was quite happy in the seat, but our 3 year old wanted to pull herself upright as the photos show. We swapped the children around which probably worked better. But this meant that our youngest could not be reclined to flat on top – we could do the first recline without it really affecting our eldest underneath. I didn’t notice at the time, but Mr BB did – and that is that the rim of the lower rumble seat was under our son’s head, and our eldest was quite some way past it. Mr BB was concerned about the metal rim ‘bumping’ a child’s head eg going up or down kerbs. I guess a liner would offer some protection. There is also no hood (as yet??) on the lower Rumble seat.

We were told the Graco Trekko Duo would be £249 for the pushchair and both seats, so, for value for money the Graco Trekko Duo seems excellent. The car seat is an extra. I obviously haven’t given it a test run but it didn’t seem too heavy to pull around on the spot (usually the time a tandem feels heaviest) – and we had almost 30kgs of child on this pushchair. We discussed the reclined upper seat issues with the people doing the demo and hopefully those can be fed back to Graco to be looked at. But although this pushchair isn’t perfect, I think for the money, you would happily get by. I think to be honest its got more to offer space wise than a Phil&Teds, with a good lower seat recline.