Almost there, but not quite great

The Unger 36 in. Nifty Nabber is definitely an improvement over the grippers that I used to have when I was a kid (you know, the ones with dinosaur heads on them?), and it is a slight improvement over another gripper that I got at Home Depot a few years ago, but I still think it leaves something to be desired.
First, the handle/grip is all the way at the back of the gripper. Now, I don’t think there’s any other place for the handle to go, since the gripper is essentially acting as an extension of one’s arm; however, it does mean that picking stuff up requires some forearm strength (the heavier the object, the more strength needed).
The bigger issue for me, though, is that the handle, the claw, and the tube are all on one plane; in other words, you’re reaching up to grab something above your head and going at it at an angle. This means that when pulling a jar off a shelf, for example, the claw is gripping the jar on an angle, which is obviously not as solid a grasp as if it were grabbing the jar straight on. It would be a very useful improvement if the Nifty Nabber’s pole were bent so that the claw were always facing straight on to the item being grabbed, rather than coming at the item from an angle.