What is Your Favourite Appliance Brand?

We were at the Jusco for the annual Members’ Day where Jusco Card members get discounts off selected items. I was actually there to buy a vacuum cleaner since my old Toshiba died on me last year (yes, people, I have not vacuumed my apartment since last year! I know. How awful. But I use the broom ok? But still, with Margaret the cat around, sweeping still won’t do a good job.)
That was why I found myself in the Home Appliance floor.
The thing with vacuum cleaners is – we have too many choices. I know some people live and die by the brands they grew up with (Nic for instance hates Pensonic products and won’t ever buy any Pensonic product – his fave brand is Panasonic). My aunt lives by Philips – anything she buys must be a Philips appliance. It must be a throwback to the days when my uncle (her brother) used to work for that Dutch company. I don’t have such a preference though I know that I’ve always had a National rice cooker and when my old rice cooker died, I went in search of a replacement and bought a National rice cooker!
So when we were hunting for a vacuum cleaner, so many brands popped up!
Electrolux, Hitachi, Toshiba….the list was endless. Plus many China brands we’d never heard of. And then there was the tough choice – bag or bagless? No wonder serious shopping trips are such a headache. So many decisions, so many risks to take!
I was thinking, let’s be environment-friendly and get a bag-less vacuum cleaner which is all the rage now.
Actually if given a choice, I’ll buy the iRobot Roomba cleaning robot but that’s a real luxury to save up for!
This little cool device is a robot that helps vacuum your floors automatically. You don’t need to lift a finger. But hey, robots don’t come cheap. So that’s on MY wish list. But really, it’s easy justifying why I need a two thousand ringgit plus vacuum cleaner. I’ll save so much of time!
Anyway, while we were discussing whether to buy a bag-less vacuum or not, we kind of detoured to the refrigerator section. My fridge is so damn old that I really need one but as consumers, again, we’re so confused by all the shapes and sizes of fridges.
A sales promoter bounced up to us when he saw me opening and closing the Panasonic fridge.
So we asked him what was a good size for a fridge say for a family of four. Besides NOT knowing the answer to that question (I was thinking maybe 355 liters is a good family size), he said we could buy whatever size we liked!
Of course we could but that’s not the answer you dummy. I mean, he could have asked questions like – do you cook? How often? Do you buy lots of fresh food to stock up? Do you have a budget? Are you looking for a green, eco-friendly fridge?
Well Nic being Nic – he gets turned off by fools easily so that day, the sales promoter could have closed a decent sale (since we were captivated by the sale price of the fridge!) but he didn’t. We walked off because we found the guy to be totally inept and untrained to focus on customers’ needs.
Anyway, if you, like me, are looking to buy an electrical appliance and don’t know how to choose, why don’t you go for something that does not guzzle electricity? It’s hard of course to decide what is really suitable but this Singaporean website gives you tips on which home appliances to buy especially if you are a greenie like me. It even has a database of registered goods for you to search for that energy consumption saver.
In the end, we bought our vacuum – a compact little thing from Hitachi. We decided on a regular vacuum with bag because I really didn’t fancy washing out the vacuum container (in the bag-less version).
By the way, what is your fave appliance brand? And more importantly, why?

6 thoughts on “What is Your Favourite Appliance Brand?”

  1. Hi Krista, when we were about to buy a vacuum cleaner, we looked at a few things. 1) It had to be a HEPA certified as our youngest has severe dust allegies. 2) It had to be of a certain budget. 3) based on that, we went to the website to see which were highly recommended and bought a Miele one. It has made all the difference to our son, even though we use special sheets for him.
    My sister bought the irobot and after using it for a while, it went kaput. She said it was quite effective but as it was round, it could not reach corners of the room.
    Generally, I am very partial towards the Miele brand – Washing machines, kitchen stoves, cooker hoods. For fridges, Fisher and Pakyl (not sure of spelling) is also pretty reliable.

    Reply
    • Hi Grace – Either I’ve been under a rock or I’ve been shopping at the wrong mall but I’ve never heard of Miele. OK, must put that on my list of brands to look out for when I next go shopping. Thanks for the tip in iRobot. Yeah, true. The round shape prevents it from really reaching into corners. Are those brands Aussie since you live in Australia? I have heard of Fisher though but not Pakly. I tried my Hitachi vacuum cleaner last night…. and it does have a lot of suction power. At 1600 W it is 200W more than my old one. Made a lot of noise too and freaked out the cat.

      Reply
  2. I don’t have a favourite, maybe it’s because I’m not at the stage where I decide the electrical appliances in my house yet. But I think my parents are Japanese-brand fans. Our air-conditioners are Mitsubishi and Toshiba.. our vacuum cleaner is probably one of them… our old TV was Hitachi, and then changed to Sony.. I forgot what brand our rice cooker is… then again, you get the idea. 😉

    Reply
    • I know your preference for Sony my dear! Actually I am a bit biased towards them too. I like the stylishness and durability of Sony equipment especially my old Sony Viao and my Sony handphone. Other than that, my TV is Sanyo. My new vacuum cleaner is Hitachi. My rice cooker is National Panasonic (again Japanese). My washing machine is National. We’re all living the Japanese way 😉 and you know how I adore Japanese food.

      Reply
  3. Hi,
    Anyone can help with the BEST BRAND for robotic vacuum cleaner?
    Price to be reasonable but more important the life of the product.
    Thanks
    Ben

    Reply

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