Radio 4, am I the only listener?

[lee8]

Re: Radio 4, am I the only listener?

I found an old receipt my parents kept for their old Philips series 90 Washer, they paid £279.99 in Leo’s the new supermarket back in 78.

It broke often and went through brushes like it was eating them.

I sound like my clients.

Intelligent peeps are not of the impression cheap washing machines will last forever, today £600 I would suggest is cheap, if you fact in prices from the 80’s a comparative price would be possibly close to £900 in today’s money. People today wouldn’t pay that and in a world that now attracts value for money there is demand for cheaper products, that is not the fault of the brands, that’s the fault of Capitalism.

Ken you sounded nervous and I was surprised it ended and went into a program about Love Honey, the sex toy supplier and there tights.

[Martin]

Re: Radio 4, am I the only listener?

I’m starting to warm to lee8’s observations and I’m thinking we are both singing from the same hymn sheet? In the interview Ken referred to entering the trade in ’84 when machines were fixable. But in truth they were less reliable, broke down frequently and were too expensive to ditch so repair work was plentiful.

They may well be equivalent to £900 in today’s money and so pound for pound less value for money than the modern stuff. Hotpoint machines were my main money source in the early 80’s. And in truth just as unreliable as they are today, the only difference was that back then they had to be fixed, today their owners have a more rational choice that doesn’t involve calling out the repair guy.

[Andy jones]

Re: Radio 4, am I the only listener?

Most of my work back in the eighties was top loaders and twin tubs and the odd power unit on the ancient hotpoint dishwashers. No need for laptops or card readers but I agree about them going wrong. To keep an office in Plymouth of 50 odd engineers doing 10 jobs a day means an awful lot of faults

[lee8]

Re: Radio 4, am I the only listener?

Its kinda obvious really. The industry had more peeps working in it. Up to the millennium there where around 10 independent shops doin whitegoods, tv’s, vac servicing etc etc etc, hell you could still go and buy elements for kettles. Cut my teeth doing that work as a young lad.

Now there are 2, none do the small repairs and most prefer to sell an appliance.

You cannot blame brands for the change, people supported the removal of RRP, when that disappeared, prices dropped, quality was never goin to improve as the margins reduced, Europe and the far east opened up and bam, here we are today complaining.

No bring back RRP, sell machines for a grand, get rid of insurance policies, send the council/benefit scum as soon as one commits a crime or does not conform to modern society with ethics and manors, kinda 2 strikes and now your f88ed instead of prison, to a local laboratory, instead of using innocent animals to test on use these imbeciles then incinerate their arses, that’ll do away with the need to sell Haier and Beko’s at stupid prices.

Then we can all get back to doin an honest days work for a decent wage, employ people and get back to a life without having to worry about finding another job or struggling to pay bills.

I believe those days used to be called Living. 😥

[Martin]

Re: Radio 4, am I the only listener?

I take that back, lee8 isn’t singing from my hymn sheet based on that synopsis. He obviously refers to some inner city deprived area and not ‘hometown UK’.

Back in the real world : and commenting on another Ken quote, the idea of “Durability Labeling” (apparently supported by DEFRA) not only would be almost impossible to quantify but, contrary to what was reported, would be detrimental overall to the trade in general. It won’t happen, so worth little discussion, but it may also blow up in the face of those that believe the modern cheap machine is not worth investing in.

I firmly believe that the modern cheapo machine provides excellent value for money based on what was quoted in the radio article of the pre-historic counterparts of the 80’s. Furthermore, the modern machine represents a fraction of the investment and as such provides even better value for money these days than in any times previously.

But I understand Ken’s motives are based purely on the promotion of the up-market ISE machines and in order to do that has to slag off the cheaper, more popular products. The stats are there to back up the brand and the proposed “Durability Labelling” will further enhance the brand.

However the rest of us that both repair and sell continue to base our reputation on giving open and honest advice on all things we do and sell. And if customers chooses an Amica over an ISE then both offer value for money equally. To suggest otherwise is wrong!

[Lawrence]

Re: Radio 4, am I the only listener?

Maybe I look at things too simply,from where I stand I want customers to buy durable machines as then they are more likely to have them repaired .
With the advent of sub £200 machines repairs look less and less viable to the consumer.
Thats if you can get the parts at all, we recently priced a Bush Bearing job the repair came to more than Argos were retailing the machine – customers response was to go and buy another one.

What is wrong with showing the consumer the facts ,tell them that
machine A is lifed for approx XXX cycles
machine B is lifed for approx XXX cycles
machine C etc etc

That way they can make a considered choice balancing budget with durability
Its no different to mileage on cars

[kwatt]

Re: Radio 4, am I the only listener?

Actually Martin you are completely and utterly wrong on the motive.

I have already explained why, if you choose to in effect call me a liar then that’s fine, just be honest about what you’re saying and stirring there.

I don’t give a flying stuff if we sell a single ISE off the back of this, that’s not why I do these things and, if it was for that purpose, do you really think I’d mention the competition in the same sentence, once for each?

You also obviously misheard (again) as I didn’t say that DEFRA supported anything at all, not even slightly. What I said was that we had been pushing for this with DEFRA and others.

Again, if you want to insult me that’s fine, just please try to refrain from making me out to be a liar or to be stating things that I did not.

You will also perhaps take note that I did not say one represented good value or bad value. What I am saying is that as things stand a person standing in a showroom or looking at a website has no information to judge for themselves what’s good, what’s bad or what value that they can expect.

This is somewhat removed from the words that you are trying to put in my mouth, I would kindly ask you not to do that as it is incorrect and not what I said at all.

I will concede that I have said that cheaper machines do not last s long. Trouble that this is a well known phenomena by anyone in these forums and borne out by all the stats you can find, lifespans have dropped.

Now please don’t try to be a smart a$$ with me Martin because as well you know, I won’t just sit and take that from anyone, I don’t much care who it is.

I don’t mind a reasoned debate, I don’t even get flustered if it gets full on heated but I do get more than a little angered when someone tries to misrepresent and warp what I have actually said, making me out to be a liar which is my take on what you’ve said.

From my perspective all I can see is that you’ve decided on what was said, mooted or implied all on your lonesome and that’ll be that, be it right or wrong or you could just be trying to put your own spin on it for your own ends, I don’t have a clue nor am I especially interested. But, you are wrong. Very wrong and I find what you’ve said here to be pretty insulting.

K.

[Martin]

Re: Radio 4, am I the only listener?

Nothing of the sort Ken. I was critical of the comments both you and Andy made for sure but at no point did I accuse or imply you of lying. I simply tried to offer what I believed was reasoned argument toward the overall content of the programme and nothing more. I’m sorry you took it that way and I apologise to you for that. 🙁

[kwatt]

Re: Radio 4, am I the only listener?

Andy jones wrote:Most of my work back in the eighties was top loaders and twin tubs and the odd power unit on the ancient hotpoint dishwashers. No need for laptops or card readers but I agree about them going wrong. To keep an office in Plymouth of 50 odd engineers doing 10 jobs a day means an awful lot of faults

To get back on track…

Yes Andy but in them days a washer was a month’s salary or more, those that were in the field already were possibly more than a month’s salary. Financially from the owner’s perspective they were worth having repaired.

As a side note, Hotpoint and Hoover who back in the day ruled the roost pretty much, also had annual maintenance stuff going on as well, that kept them plenty busy too. The modern day take on that is BG and DAG polices that suck lifeblood out the retailers, manufacturers and repairers but they don’t all get that.

Relatively, the cost of an engineer calling (even OEM service) was not high enough to trip the “is it worth the hassle” trigger in people’s heads. Simply because the cost of service over the past X years really hasn’t altered all that much while the purchase cost of an appliance has plummeted in real terms.

What that says is that the service side has been devalued as much as the machines. That leads to a heap more rabbit holes to go spelunking in if you care to do so.

There’s a whole heap of conversation that you can have around that but the upshot, in my opinion, is that the entire industry has allowed itself to be devalued and not just financially but also in the eyes of consumers. And, I’m not just speaking about us, the repairers (at heart, I still am one) but also the manufacturers who allowed (I suspect) their sales people to whore their products at ever lower price points to retailers and customers.

That leads to parts that were perhaps once, relationally, okay on price appearing to now be overpriced. In some cases, massively overpriced. Spare parts however are considerably more complex that many will appreciate as are the costings involved. Unless you’ve been involved in that side of things, it’s hard to comment with authority and even I, whilst I may know more than many, don’t profess to be an “expert”.

But that does seem to further dissuade a repair over replacement.

As depressing as all that might seem and, I don’t and wouldn’t argue that it wasn’t, there might be ways to reverse that trend and inject value back into the whitegoods industry and, by association, the repair side of things.

The durability labelling thing is just one piece of that puzzle but I acknowledge, an important one. It lets people see what they’re buying but, more than that.

What I suspect would happen or, should in an efficient manner if the industry responds the way you would expect, is that you’d start to see the equivalent of the 2 years or 40,000 miles warranty translated to our products. So, you get 5 years or 2500 cycles and so on or similar.

Miele already do this.

As much as some who want to detract the benefit of that, it does the repair industry an utterly staggeringly huge favour.

Why?

Well, if you have an owner who’s machine has only done 1000 cycles but is busted at 18 months or whatever yet the machine is rated for 2500 then that £100 repair suddenly becomes a whole different proposition.

It could well be and, I’ve no data to back this, that we’d see a shift back to more repair over replacement. I don’t know, I don’t have all the answers.

Even without the data to back the play though, I’d be willing to take a punt that this is better than sitting on our thumbs hoping that the world will see us alright as, invariably, it will not.

It also stops completely the sales person or website saying “this is a great machine that will last you for years and it’s only £199.99” as that lie would be exposed in a heartbeat.

Sure manufacturers could lie as could retailers but, once they get tarred with that in this game, it tends to stick for a long, long time.

So, from my point of view, what I have been banging on about has no downside for the engineers at all. Maybe there is and I’m not seeing it but, to date, no argument presented puts any sort of credible holes in this notion.

K.

[lee8]

Re: Radio 4, am I the only listener?

Judging by Dixons merger with Carphone warehouse and there plans for the future, maybe cheap products are going to be written into history, maybe the current situation is a way to bully people into return to the quality products that can be serviced as opposed to scraped.

There will be more info, more flash adverts when the merge is complete, but it seems Ken will be like a pig in shi8e sat at home using his SmartHub gizmo’s.

[lee8]

Re: Radio 4, am I the only listener?

I’m seeing double.

[Author]

Posts