They don't make em like they used to

[hyperD]

I've got a Zanussi that's been going on for about 20 years. Mind you, I'm a believer in wearing pants and shirts twice sometimes and certainly don't wash casual clothes at the weekend for a while. However, since GF#1 and her daughters arrival, that thing hasn't stopped spinning since January - it sounds like bloody Heathrow airport - I suspect its days are numbered.

[evilagent]

I totally get the idea of quality over tat.
But with domestic appliances the products lose value almost immediately.
You are describing a specialist product where there are knowledgeable and keen enthusiasts whi appreciate the difference.
I dont really think you can do that with wash machines.

Yes you must be really bored.
Its sunny. Go for a walk.

[doodab]

Doodab's theory of value

When it comes to white goods I prefer mid priced tat.
I know it wont last forever and get a shiny new one in a few years.
I tend to renew every four to five years.
Dont want same old gadgets for years and years.

I suppose that as well as being personal choice to some degree, it depends to a large extent on what you are buying and whether there is a secondary market. I think the deciding factor in many cases is the pace of technological evolution, and whether the sort of product has reached that stage in the evolutionary cycle where more or less everything on the market is good enough to remain useful until it finally falls apart.

White goods and consumer electronics are generally purchased new and considered disposable (which makes some sense where features evolve quickly such as some consumer electronics items) but where you have technologically mature products which become obsolete more slowly (cars, SLR lenses or musical instruments for example) there is a thriving secondhand market and quality items will tend to hold their value and sometimes even appreciate over the long term, whereas lower end ones tend to lose value and even become completely worthless remarkably quickly in much the same way as consumer electronics or white goods do.

For example I have a small electronic music studio comprised primarily of high quality items that were built to last, or at least it is now as I've bought and sold my share of cheap tat along the way . This is stuff that doesn't undergo radical technical changes very often (although it does occasionally, as like many such things digital technology really shook things up) and is currently in a phase of evolution with each new generation of products offering "more of the same" rather than a massive leap forward. Most of my current inventory I bought second hand. Aside from the fact that I find the quality gear nicer to use than cheaper plastic tat, the good stuff is still worth more or less what I paid for it several years later and a couple of items (synthesizers that were top end at the time they were made) have more than doubled in value relative to what I paid. It's been a similar story with quality stuff I've bought new and subsequently sold, I've always got 60-75% of the new price for it, and the top end drum machine that cost me £800 new is still worth £6-700 second hand several years on.

With the cheaper stuff, I've lost a small fortune e.g. a "bread and butter" low end synth I bought new for a £400 was worth only £100 when I flogged it a couple of years later, and I'm currently considering picking up a modern equivalent that was close to £500 new a few years ago for around £150-200 (that's one generation old too, an older top end equivalent would set me back around £800-1000 which is about half what a new one would cost in today's money. The older top end model is still ahead on features though).

The worst thing I've had was the "cheaper alternative" to the current audio interface I have. I bought it new (it was half the price of the top end model) and it lost most of it's value in less than two years, although this could partially be attributed to the shoddy drivers, reputation for quality issues, and the manufacturer dropping support for it after a few years because it was un****ingsupportably tulipe. The one I have now I bought second hand, it's actually older than that one I had was, but despite that it has better technical specs, rock solid driver software, is still supported by the manufacturer and is still worth around 75% of what it cost the first owner. He may have paid twice as much to start with but he actually lost less money than I did when he sold it on, and he had the benefit of owning and using a top notch product for years instead of being driven mad by a pile of cheap tulipe. TBH I think that whole experience really changed my perception of cheap stuff in general. That bastard thing practically destroyed my ability to make music for 2 years.

It's a similar story with camera lenses. The top end lenses I bought new are all worth at least 75-80% of what I paid for them, and it's 100% or more for the ones I bought second hand as the new equivalents have only got more expensive. OTOH the "bargain" sigma zoom I bought for £150 new was worth about £30 when I decided to get rid of it, I ended up giving it to a mate to complement his kit lens. DSLR bodies are a different story. During the initial phase of rapid evolution as they evolved fairly quickly they tended to lose value rapidly but as the pace of evolution has slowed they have started to hold their value better.

So there is a strong case for avoiding cheap tat in a lot of cases.

I also find higher end products in general more long lived in terms of features. They are often ahead in terms of performance and features to the extent that it takes cheaper products several years to catch up. You might get something shiny with new features every five years, but often you can get the same "new" features and level of performance you'll get in five years now if you spend a bit more, and the better product will still be going then. A ten year old Mercedes for example will generally have all of the gadgets a brand new "cheap" car has and more. My mothers 10 year old oven has far more stuff going on than the brand new but cheap one in our rented house, while the Bosch washing machine that came with it clearly cost a bit more and does all sorts of clever tulip that a bottom end one like the one ms doodab recently put into one of her BTLs simply doesn't.

I do see your point in some cases though. With newer, especially digital, technology that evolves rapidly such as smartphones, tablets, computers etc you generally want to stay on the bleeding edge, although even there I'd say a top end model will outlast a cheaper one.

White goods are a funny one though, they are in general technologically mature so I'd expect the quality vs cheap dichotomy to play out differently. I guess the market is influenced by the fact that these are more or less mandatory (as opposed to discretionary) purchases so the buy side is constrained by cost to a greater degree than the other examples I've given.

I must be pretty bored this morning to have typed that lot

[suityou01]

That's the trouble with this country - People who tolerate tat!

My Miele washing mashine cost the thick end of a grand, but it is built like the Tirpitz and is still going strong after over ten years.

It's the mileage what counts Owly. Washing your grundys once a week ain't high miles. Our wm is on 24/7. Beko I think.

[OwlHoot]

When it comes to white goods I prefer mid priced tat. ...

That's the trouble with this country - People who tolerate tat!

My Miele washing mashine cost the thick end of a grand, but it is built like the Tirpitz and is still going strong after over ten years.

[evilagent]

When it comes to white goods I prefer mid priced tat.
I know it wont last forever and get a shiny new one in a few years.
I tend to renew every four to five years.
Dont want same old gadgets for years and years.

4-5 years usage is a good return for 300.

Once thought about spending 900 on a dyson washing machine then realised they would introduce a new and better design every year.

[doodab]

BBC News - Getting in a spin: Why washing machines are no longer built to last

And they admit it.

The Whitegoods Trade Association (WTA) openly acknowledges that the average lifespan has dropped in relation to prices.

Take the example of a washing machine.

Its life expectancy has dropped by a full three years over the last decade or so, meaning many will conk out pretty quickly.

"Over 40% cost under £300. Obviously these cheaper products do not have the same build quality, performance or longevity and therefore the average lifespan has dropped from over 10 years to under seven years," the website confesses.

"It is not unusual for cheaper appliances to only last a few years now," it adds.

And elsewhere a guy whose retail company repairs the things it sells says

"There is too much premature scrapping," he says.

"The trouble is it's in the interests of manufacturers to get three sales out of people every 10 years -- not one. Because they don't have repair departments that make profits, customers are always pointed towards new products," he claims.

Buy cheap, buy twice as they say. Or even three times.

Personally I've always thought that buying cheap tat that doesn't last is a false economy, to the extent that I work hard not to have any of it in my house. Some people think of this as snobbery for some reason, whereas I think it's common sense.