I'm fairly sure David Oreck sold the company all those years ago, because he was getting up in age and didn't want the stress of the day to day operations of a large company. I personally don't want to work past the age of 60, so I can understand.
The way I see it (from inside the vacuum manufacturing world), Oreck's problems were many - but they were easy to solve. It's just that no one did.
80% of all new vacuums sold are bagless. It's a fact that most people want a bagless. Whether we as collectors like them or not is immaterial. It's the opinion of the public that matters to a manufacturer. Interestingly, Oreck's new bagless (the Touch - made in China) is actually a good bagless with really good suction and a good multi-cyclonic separation system. They needed it ten years ago. But should have made it in America.
Another problem is all the returns Oreck gets. They advertise a 30 day trial period and free return shipping if you don't keep it. Lots of people are drawn to that offer, and many people DO return them. After all, having two vacuums (upright and hand held canister) isn't very convenient for the general public. Older people will find that different - but a younger person would not like having to drag out two vacuums. Many people are surprised when using an Oreck by the lack of the feeling that it's cleaning DEEPLY. For a vacuum that isn't carried by retailers like Wal-Mart and Target (until very recently) they sure did have enough returns to outfit every Big Lots in this country.
Another problem is the Franchise store and Company owned store principal. IF you sell your vacuums through specialty stores, you can't cut their throats on price. Sadly, many Oreck stores lose sales directly to Oreck Corporation because the web site price is less than the Oreck Franchise Store's cost at wholesale. The Company-owned stores are a real drain on the company's bottom line.
Another problem is they do not update their core products. Yes, the 8 pound vacuum must remain 8 pounds in order to capture the 'older folks' market - but there are many changes that could have been made along the way in order to create a better cleaning machine. There's no comparison in cleaning ability between a Riccar Supralite and an Oreck. Riccar can clean rings around the Oreck. While both use the same type of design and engineering - the brush roller is many times superior in the Riccar. The Riccar creates the feeling of actually cleaning, where the Oreck creates only the feel of gliding over the rug. This 'feeling' to the customer is crucial in their ultimate happiness with the product.
The entire Halo debacle also hurt Oreck tremendously. The cost of the lawsuit by owners as well as the headaches to the company brought about by the government over the advertising for that machine - have been tremendously draining on the company's profits. They lost many, many millions of dollars on that one.
The Franchise store owners are now also selling Miele. To have two competing products in the same store, with one being much better than the other, has also cost Oreck sales. Yes, the Miele upright is heavy, but the Miele canisters are light years ahead of Oreck's canisters. The profits on Miele are much better as well.
All in all, whomever buys Oreck needs to also hire some really good engineers, who will design brand new products. The tremendous cost of the tooling to make even one new model is overwhelming. I actually foresee (and I may be wrong - so don't quote me) another vacuum manufacturer (like TTI) buying Oreck. What ever happens, I believe the name "Oreck" will continue in some form or another. Euro-Pro is actually in a position that they could buy Oreck and continue to sell them - but they most surely will be completely built in China if that happens.
