Hopefully, there's never a need for the blood, but storing it is a form of health insurance (for both the baby and other family members) and we didn't want to regret our decision down the road.  A couple things we did that you can also do to help with the expense...  Set up a gift registry at CBR and let family and friends help defray the expense by contributing.  Also use the $250 coupon from
http://www.cord-blood-banking-coupon.com