Reply to thread

Help Support VacuumLand:

Message: <blockquote data-quote="danemodsandy" data-source="post: 176172" data-attributes="member: 184">I Think........This sort of thing happens for two reasons:1) Cost reduction, obviously.  No need to explain that one, sadly.2) A new, younger generation of designers who have little or no experience with actual use of competent products.  This is something I'm seeing more and more of, and I'm a design writer who deals with this stuff every day.  I see products that any housewife could design far better - because the housewife has actually USED such things and knows what is important and how stuff should work.  Anyone who has used a vacuum with proper bumpers where they're needed would know that a good vacuum should have them.  But there's a whole generation of people now who haven't been around good stuff - they think design is all about striking colors and shapes.  The notion that a vacuum should not commit violence upon the legs of fine furniture seems not to occur to them.  Right now, the most horrendously-designed category I can think of is sinkware - all the things that make dishwashing by hand easier.  I see ludicrously inadequate dishdrainers, so shallow they can not hold dishes safely upright, I see cheaply chrome-plated sponge caddies that will rust within weeks, I see sink mats made of WOOD, fercryinoutloud.  It is as if - no, it must be true that - the people designing this stuff have never washed dishes for a family in their lives, much less done it long enough to see sinkware get old enough that problems with materials are apparent.  It seems to be all about putting something glitzy and profitable into stores, and never mind how well it works.  Or lasts.Stove-top tools are the same thing - Ekco used to make Bakelite-handled stainless spatulas and the like that never rusted and protected the hand in use.  Today, Giada de Laurentiis's stuff in Target is stainless, but there's nothing to prevent the sleek stainless handle from heating up.  If you look for tools with plastic handles that won't heat up, you often find their business ends are cheap chrome-plate that will start leaving rust spots on your kitchen towels within weeks. It is as if this society is moving backwards - we should have begun with cheap, breakable plastic stuff full of failure-prone electronics, and evolved to the point of having simple, durable metal things with electro-mechanical technology that takes decades to wear out.  And we should have moved from nasty, hard-bristled, bumperless vac tools to well-made, well-bumpered, soft-bristled tools like Lux was able to supply forty and fifty years ago.  I'm off my soapbox.</blockquote>

Verification