I am able to re-use because I use cannazyme. Cannazyme eats down dead root matter and I actually find my ladies actually respond very well to this. I don't use the cogr bricks though....that could be a different story. I just use the ground up coco. As far as my nutrients I use, they may be pricy, and there may be cheaper equivalent nutes, but the saying I live by goes if you do what you've always done, your always going to get the same results and I have no complaints about my results