Members of the board of BSH Home Appliance Corporation and its German parent company joined many of their 1,160 employees at the New Bern plant on Tuesday to launch a new line of dishwashers manufactured in America for Americans.
The German company is the world’s third-largest appliance manufacturer with about 20 percent of the high-end dishwasher market worldwide. It has worked more than two years on a new mid-priced model and hopes to double its 5 to 6 percent United States market share in two years.
“The company has invested $300 million in the US in factories with state-of-the-art facilities and this is the most important investment of BSH of all new manufacturing in the world,” said Kurt-Ludwig Gutberlet, chief executive officer and chairman of the board of BSH Bosch und Siemens Hausgerate GmbH, in Munich, Germany, parent company of BSH Home Appliances.
“What we have done here shows clearly the commitment of BSH to stay here and grow here,” Gutberlet said.
The company has created an economic and employment base in New Bern “at a time many of their competitors are moving their manufacturing operations overseas,” stated Jim Davis, Craven County economic development director.
“We are also pleased that on this product they continue to use some of their suppliers that have come to North Carolina with them,” Davis said.
North American operations president Franz Bosshard said the Ascenta line of dishwashers “is the start of another first for BSH, a quiet, quality-efficient, consumer-satisfying product manufactured in the country where the consumers are.”
The Energy Star-rated models offer high efficiency, quiet performance and a stainless steel tub and reinforced polypropylene base for durability. The top of the line model uses 190 kilowatts to operate at an estimated $17 annual cost.
The Ascenta line will be introduced at a Chicago appliance industry trade show April 11 and be available for sale at Lowe’s, Sears, and other Bosch appliance retailers by mid-May, said Uwe Klossowski, dishwasher plant and New Bern site manager.
Klossowski said the dishwashers “have a planned life of about 10 years and have been revamped to be more energy-efficient, water-efficient and quiet than all dishwashers in their class.”
Martin Knobloch, head of U.S. sales and marketing, said the expected retail price range for the machines is between $479 and $799.
Klossowski led company officials on a tour of the new assembly line designed to manufacture the new dishwasher, staffed with employees trained in conjunction with those at company plants in Germany, Poland, and Turkey. The multi-national approach to designing the assembly line and product and training assemblers is a company first.
Werner Vogt, company vice chairman and chief of technology, said the efficiencies of the new machines are reflected in the research and development, training of core assembly employees, and the assembly line.
“The mindset starts in research and development and continues into the manufacturing that, if properly developed, produces the best quality,” said Vogt.
He said that if the product sells as projected, the assembly line designed to produce 1,500 dishwashers a day using two shifts will turn out 1,500 dishwashers a day and create more employment here.
The BSH New Bern manufacturing plant opened in 1997 and now manufactures dishwashers, washers, dryers, ranges, ovens and cook tops.
