The towels are great, compact and absorbant. Living in Canada, sometimes a towel is also a blanket from wind, and these towels don't cut it in that area. Once wet, they become very cold, so if you are at an outdoor pool or beach and once out of the water, the wind makes you chilly, these wo'nt keep you warm the way wrapping in a terrycloth tewel will. We bought the kids ponchos, but once wet, they become very sticky on the skin and are impossible to pull down over the child's body. Therefore I had to remove the side seams and replace with snaps. The head hole is also a little small so it's not easy to just "throw on" a child. The snaps definitely helped and I'd recommend this as a potential design for the future.