Don’t buy this one if you want to effectively vacuum your floors and carpets
Our ears pricked up when we heard about Hoover’s new baby, cockily named The One. With its striking design and ““ unusually for Hoover ““ a premium price tag, this bagless upright looks like an attempt to woo Dyson devotees. Hoover reckons The One is the result of two years’ development work, so we wondered whether it could really herald a resurgence.
Unfortunately, it’s a disaster. It might look fancy, but its cleaning results are among the worst we’ve ever seen. It manages to collect just 5 per cent of dust from floorboards. And using this machine to “˜clean’ your carpet is, truth be told, a waste of time ““ it picks up only about 34 per cent of dust (compare that with the Dyson DC07, which sucks up 86 per cent of dust). It barely touches pet hair, either.
Results this ropey are rare, so we tried a couple more Ones to check we hadn’t bought a dud. But they were just as bad. And we showed our results to Hoover. It says it’s carried out its own tests and has the “˜utmost confidence’ in The One. We don’t.
Hoover has long been the everyday word for vacuum cleaner but, despite its historic cachet, it’s not the leading brand it once was. One in four new vacs bought is a Dyson, and Electrolux is the second biggest seller.
Hoover’s recent test results have been unremarkable, too ““ its models look pretty lacklustre compared with Miele’s consistently efficient machines and the excellent cleaning power of Dyson vacs. In fact, we haven’t had a Best Buy Hoover since 2000.
Copy of published report from Which (Oct 2004)
