Bottom line up front: Not a total fail, but an overall disappointment. I was truly hoping this was going to be Coleman's great (American made) entrance into the super cooler market. I was wrong. I am typically an over informed consumer especially when dropping this kind of cash but the biggest problem right now is that this cooler is too new. In other words, there aren't any unbiased reviews out there by competent folks (as of May '16). The few reviews that exist are done by people that were given coolers by Coleman. In other words, a poor review equates to less of a chance of getting free swag next year. So, lets get to it:
Pros:
Decent warranty (6 years)
Khaki and green color looks good
Rubber locking handles are nice
Huge drain cap (2 big flaws though, see below)
Cutting board (good idea, poorly executed, see below)
One of the best volume per dollar super coolers on the market (i.e.- good bang for your buck!)
Comes with dry rack
Thick walls
It's not a YETI, so I didn't have to spend $750 to get a 130+ quart cooler!
Cons:
The drain cap is 2 inches off the bottom of the cooler. With a cooler this size that's enough to leave 3+ gallons of water behind (over 25 additional pounds). It's also made from brittle plastic and the retaining tab is just a fold of plastic. I give it 3 months. The black plastic has already turned white from fatigue where it was bent over from the factory.
Cutting board is okay, but the mounts that hold it in place on the inside of the lid seem to be an after thought. Cheap plastic and poorly placed and don't actually click the board in to retain it well.
The handle mounts are riveted into the side of the cooler (like a cheap China Coleman cooler) instead of molded in. They just look out of place like they for got to design them.
The molding looks cheap. There's a ton of molding seams all over the cooler. Just not something you'd expect from a cooler in the $400-$600 price range.
This thing is basically an old school Coleman cooler on steroids. And not the good kind of steroids that make you jacked and super fast. More like the kind that make you look okay for a week and then make you fat and slow right after that. So what do I mean?... This is NOT a rotomold cooler! It's NOTHING like the rest of the market of super coolers out there (YETI, Grizzly, Engel, Canyon, Orion, ORCO, RTIC, etc.). To be fair, Colman never actually says they're rotomolded. They very carefully say that they are “molded”. What they mean is injected molded… like the rest of their coolers. The Esky series is basically the original $30 Coleman plastic cooler that's in your basement that you've had for the last 14 years. The plastic is roughly 1/32 of an inch thick. If it weren't for the rubber feet, I could easily see someone rubbing through the bottom corners of the cooler after some normal wear on a driveway.
At the end of the day I'm still glad I didn't get a YETI. But I should have just spent $25 more dollars and gotten a few less quarts and gone with the Engels.
I hope this helps you hard-core cooler kings out there.
