Broken stuff

About 2 weeks ago, the clothes washer died. I wanted to get another, and it didn't have to be fancy, just your basic washer.

I remembered seeing appliances at Home Depot; since I buy a lot of stuff there, I went to look.
I got there early and chose a mid range one, not the cheapest, not the most expensive, a decent looking GE.

When I got it, it wasn't working, as soon as it started to fill up, water poured out the bottom, and not from any exposed hose coupling were I could fix it.
I called the store and they sent over an identical one within about 20 minutes.
This one did not work either, it filled and drained fine, but the agitator did not work.
I called the store, by then, I was Not Happy.

My call was courteous, but I pointed out that I wanted to wash clothes, and to be set two non working machines in a row was not part of my expectations.

I told them I wanted a workng machine, I did not care if it was the cheapest they had, or the most expensive, but I wanted it in my garage and washing clothes and I wanted it that day.

About 3 hours later, they sent over a beautiful Maytag, considerably more expensive that what I had bought, and it worked flawlessly.

I spend a lot of money at Home Depot, and I have talked to a couple appliance people, the are pretty friendly there. What one of them told me is that often a store will order 10% more machines than it expects to sell because of the percent it expects will not work.

I ended up with a nice washer, but I really did not expect to have to spend as much time as I did purchasing one.

Is there really that much broken stuff out on showroom floors?

I don't know if they keep non-working items or not, but I had no trouble with my washer and drier. We went with the Roper brand washer and drier. I paid less than $650 for both and they work great. I can wash and dry 12 pairs of pants no problem. The Roper brand is also said to have the fewest repair calls of any other brand washer and drier.

It sucks that it took that many tries to find one that worked. I hope this one works longer than the others.

Robert

Mass production at its finest.

I'm sure I read somewhere that, because of mass production and the fact it's been with us so long, the companies churning out this crap can tell to within a few months when their products are going to die. Because of this and citing cost as a reason they deliberately design things to last not longer than 18 months. This is apprently the optimum figure to keep us buying. If it lasts too long then we'll get it repaired, not long enough and they have the warranty issues.

I'll see if I can find a link to it; it's probably not even news to most of us. I'm sure Sony got a real kicking in the research they did.

Originally Posted by King of Snake

I'm sure I read somewhere that, because of mass production and the fact it's been with us so long, the companies churning out this crap can tell to within a few months when their products are going to die. Because of this and citing cost as a reason they deliberately design things to last not longer than 18 months. This is apprently the optimum figure to keep us buying. If it lasts too long then we'll get it repaired, not long enough and they have the warranty issues.

I'll see if I can find a link to it; it's probably not even news to most of us. I'm sure Sony got a real kicking in the research they did.

What you are referring to is 'technological obsolescence'. Where products are actually designed to fail in a given time-frame to keep the consumers buying more products.

I've had my Kitchen-Aid washer and dryer for close to 15 years without so much as a service call. They weren't the most expensive or the least but somewhere in the middle, and they came from a small appliance store. They've even made it through two moves, one of which was over 600 miles. I think perhaps sometimes it depends on luck.