General Enquiries And Questions

Hi there,
First thing I would like to say is I work for a shop selling whitegoods and I would really like to thanks ukwhitegoods.co.uk for what I see as excellent training. I'm one of these people who wants to know everything about what im selling and it's so annoying when, unsupprisingly, the companies only give you glossy brosure training. It has been a real eye opener reading this website and given me extra reason to want to encourage people to buy a better built product. Note I don't say sell up as that's not quite how I see things.

This brings me on to my main point. Should I feel guilty when I sell, Indesit, beko etc whitegoods? I'm not a pushy salesman, i prefer the customer service route but i can't help but feel guilty everytime i sell one of these types of applience as i know how awful it is, no matter how much i tell the customer it is.
I was just wondering if there is any other retailers on here that feel like me, what consumers feel of my feeling and im presuming the engineers on here are happy as it keeps work coming your way

Thanks for you time,
Dave

Welcome aboard, Dave.

Interesting times, eh? There is a place for budget appliances - people will just buy the damn things. I would suggest that so long as you have some "reasonable", "better" and "best" alternatives available, you can rest easy - it's up to the customer in the end.

Then they come on here and complain............

If you're in the trade, contact admin@ukwhitegoods.co.uk with your business details and ask for trade access. It's a real eye-opener!

Penguin45.

Thanks for the warm welcome. Unfortunatly i'm not trade, Just a grunt on the front line getting hassle from a manager because i don't sell enough insurance lol, need it with the crap we sell.
This is generally my recommendations so please correct me here to provide better customer service.

Washing machines:
-£350 - Zanussi
£400-£600 - Bosch (Logixx) or LG (not sure on these but we havn't had many problems.
£600+ - Miele (sorry we don't sell ISE)

I used to say AEG till i read some articles on here. Any one know anything about these new Panasonics yet?

Dishwashers
-£350 - Zanussi and dare i say it hotpoint
£350-£600 - Bosch
£600+ - Miele and the nice Bosch Logixx with the cuttlry tray, just because i like it

Dryers
I find this a hard one, i'd say indesit or hotpoint (same thing) then it kinda jumps up massively to your Bosch, Siemens and Miele

Refridgeration
I hate this but
-£400 Hotpoint
+£400 AEG, Bosch, Miele

Cooking
I honestly can't except Neff and AEG, Not had a hand on with Miele so unfair for me to say.

How does that stand up to professional opinion on here?

Our Retail Guru, The Don ( ) will probably voice an opinion in the morning, no doubt........ I'm afraid I just fix things and sell ISE machines. They're something I have faith in.

Penguin45.

scarified wrote:Thanks for the warm welcome. Unfortunatly i'm not trade, Just a grunt on the front line getting hassle from a manager because i don't sell enough insurance lol, need it with the crap we sell.
This is generally my recommendations so please correct me here to provide better customer service.

Hi Dave

Like P45 says welcome to the board, it`s good to have another like minded retailer aboard. Reading betwen the lines do you by any chance work for one of the big "C`s" as the insurance part of your post seems all to familiar .

Again not to quote P45 too much, like me you are in retail so you are trade, so why not apply for trade access? You will be surprised at how much you can learn on the "other side" and the banter is good fun as well.

When it comes to product ranges like you I always want to look after our customers and I don`t like selling the budget lines but sometimes that`s all the customer wants and is not prepared to be educated When it comes to build, reliability, guarantee lengths and service backup. We are Bosch, Hotpoint group, Neff and Miele authorised dealers. These provide our core stock along with any special buys we feel are a reasonable product at a good price. we can therefore supply products from budget to premium depending on the customers requirements.


Yep I agree with you on your product choices, on tumble dryers I personally like the White Knight range by Crosslee, they are good honest machines built well for the price and are easy to repair, far better than the Hotpoint`s and Indesit`s Built in appliances it`s Neff for us everytime, unless it`s a property let of course then yes it will always be a budget machine.

which part of the country are you in


The Don

The way i see it with low end white goods is that the customer doesnt find them as interesting as they do when it comes to replacing the TV or the like.
They just want the cheapest they can find?? dont seem interested in any special features apart from how fast it spins? and obviously the correct colour to match their kitchen?
When they buy a new tv they want the biggest..flatest...all bells and whistles because this is a product that "entertains" them.
I find that with a washing machine or f/f or dryer...they spend little time at it as it dont take long to fill it up wether it be a w/m f/f or t/d etc...press a button and walk away.. then forget about it.. i think they regard it as a actual chore.

This is just my opinion/assumption.. but obviously not everyone is like this.

It would be interesting to see a thread for the engineers on the forums to post what products they actually have in situ in their homes.

I have a siemens w/m, sienems t/d and a miele ff f/f.
Close to 2 grands worth at time of purchase, all still under warranty.

Quite agree about the tv scenario although we have seen a shift towards the premium end of late, perhaps joe public is starting to wake up to the fact that buying cheap means buying twice.

LJDomestics wrote:It would be interesting to see a thread for the engineers on the forums to post what products they actually have in situ in their homes.

You start it off then and we`ll follow

LJDomestics wrote:
I have a siemens w/m, sienems t/d and a miele ff f/f.
Close to 2 grands worth at time of purchase, all still under warranty.

Very nice

I'm far from a typical buyer, but have been in sales as well as service.
Like the Original Poster, I had difficulty selling rubbish...so, my take on it.-


Most people seem to see whitegoods as either a "gismo" to show -off (the Dyson syndrome) or, utilitarian, like the central-heating pump and boiler.

If, having explained to the customer, the primary function of the appliance and it's relationship to it's price-point, If they still consider flash eye-appeal to be paramount, I'd feel no guilt whatsoever.

If the customer listens, takes on board the fact that low-priced stuff lacks durability, and you are unable, or they are disinclined to buy quality on a finance deal, then i'd try to steer them to the best value among the dross.

In the day, I sold cigarette-lighters from 99p (there was a 40p per lighter "match-tax" -to protect the match-industry) to £140..odd.

The former was a robust,pressed-tin petrol lighter, stood abuse,worked anywhere, no big deal if you lost it or damaged it. the latter was a beautiful piece of precision -engineered jewellery.

Horses for courses. the sub-£250 washer is good value for the price....unfortunately, so was a Trabant car, but you really wouldn't want to buy one!- if that's all you feel you can comfortably finance and are prepared to chance the unreliability and breakdowns, that's what i'd sell you.

I see the major problem as being a polarised market...ISE/ Miele at the top.

crap at the bottom.......a very sparse, murky middle-area.....is the Merlioni top-end REALLY worth double the price of their cheapest line?

Were I in that position, I think that would be the sticky area, though spares price/availability and service would probably be a large part of the story.

don wrote:Reading betwen the lines do you by any chance work for one of the big "C`s" as the insurance part of your post seems all to familiar .

For my sins yes. Hope you can understand I don't want to say which one as i don't want anything coming back on me.
I know straight away by admiting to where abouts I work thats looses alot of respect from some of you guys but I hope you understand I don't want to be seen a box shifter muppet like most of em. And don't even get me started on insurance sales, any one would think I got a job a direct line

Back on topic, Interesting reading. So basically as long as I explain in plain simple english why they shouldnt buy crap I shouldn't feel guilty, lol seems fair enough.

I refused to sell the cheap stuff and, here's the laugh, when people used to tell me they could get a "whatever" for "whatever price" from "whoever" (usually Comet or Currys) I'd quite brazenly tell them to go buy a machine there then if that's what they wanted.

It wasn't arrogance on my part it was just, I couldn't be bothered with getting into bartering nor was I ever prepared to lower my standards or the quality of goods I'd sell to meet the price points. Just my opinion and you can either respect it or not. But I can sleep easy at night.

I've no doubt that many people get on just fine with both as, if they didn't then they wouldn't still be in business so they must do something right. But, to me, they just pile 'em high, sell 'em cheap.

As for the original question and, this is only my personal opinion...

Most of the Zanussi machines I've seen of late I don't like but I don't know them well enough to make much more of that. That said, the feedback from the dealers that do sell/service them these days isn't exactly a glowing report. Shame, it was a good brand at one time, then the accountants stepped in.

Bosch, more and more are having the costs cut. Virtually nothing is actually "German" these days beyond the badge. It is starting to show.

Miele, good machine in general. Shame about the spares and labour pricing when they break. There are also some minor issues that I want to explore for myself that owners have been telling me about, especially with the honeycomb drum.

But all in all, probably the best you can do with what you've got these days.

Dryers, the White Knight/Crosslee things are noisy but other than that, as Don says, they're okay. Beyond that you're way up the scale. The cheap Bosch ones are a Gorenje in a dress.

Refrigeration, depends what you're looking at but for bog standard freestanding fridge freezers, avoid anything remotely with a whiff of Indesit about it, more so if it has electronics involved.

Bosch, not too bad.

AEG, save a packet, buy a Zanussi or Electrolux and get it cheaper with a different colour of trim. Use the saving to buy a warranty.

Miele, save money, go elsewhere and and buy the same unit with a Liebherr badge on it. No need for the warranty generally, anything that will break you'll have to pay for at any rate, like bottle shelves.

Cooking... you really don't wanna go there.

Depends on the requirements.

HTH

K.

scarified wrote:

don wrote:Reading betwen the lines do you by any chance work for one of the big "C`s" as the insurance part of your post seems all to familiar .

For my sins yes. Hope you can understand I don't want to say which one as i don't want anything coming back on me.
I know straight away by admiting to where abouts I work thats looses alot of respect from some of you guys but I hope you understand I don't want to be seen a box shifter muppet like most of em. And don't even get me started on insurance sales, any one would think I got a job a direct line

Back on topic, Interesting reading. So basically as long as I explain in plain simple english why they shouldnt buy crap I shouldn't feel guilty, lol seems fair enough.

i wouldnt worry about it mate, i work for comet as well
has to be comet, i dont seem to have any knowledge of anyone from currys on here (im sure ill be corrected)

why do you worry about losing respect from people?

bottom line is, your honest, you know what your doing and ppl wil respect that
i wont lie, ive been singled out for being a comet engineer, but , i stuck with it... at the end of the day, what makes anyone on here better or worse than me? we all work, we all do different things, and anyone who criticses you for doing your job simply isnt worth bothering about.
over the past couple of years ive managed to acquire a lot of mutual respect on here, wasnt easy at times, but ive found the engineers on here will always respect your opinion, whether its right or wrong.. a bit of healthy debate never hurt anyone.. quite often it helps ppl with important life choices
fair play to you for standing up and sayin what youve said, not many can or do
so, welcome on board, its nice to see someone who actually understands the day to day things we as engineers have to deal with on a daily basis

and some good points there kwatt

i have to say ive been massively dissapointed with the quality of the recent zanussi machines... is it a blip? who knows, only time will tell.. seems the welded tubs wont go away though

i only tell people to go for the more expensive bosch stuff now, the amount of handles ive fitted on the cheaper models is quite unbelievable

I NEVER recommend a fridge freezer now, i just dont see how many are any good, i always say steer clear of the hoptoint/indesit badged stuff..absolutely amazes me how many people will buy these things cos they can get 6 cans of coke in the handy door rack.... the electronics are plainly pants

if a customer has a vague idea, theyll be aware of liebherr anyway, and would genetrally already have one

jobs getting harder , but people still buy the haier stuff en masse and continue to whinge about it

http://www.comet.co.uk/shopcomet/produc ... ab/reviews

always makes me chuckle

i do wonder where it will all be in 2 years

helo_75 wrote:has to be comet, i dont seem to have any knowledge of anyone from currys on here (im sure ill be corrected)

Consider yourself corrected!

There are people on here from both as well as other national retailers. In fact, I don't know of one that doesn't have a presence on here in one form or another.

All do their best so far as I can see, inside the constraints that they have to operate within both in sales and service.

K.

didnt think it would take long....

its good to know theres a cross section of the trade in here, helps create a good understanding. ive found the trade section invaluable