Can someone recommend some decent kitchen/laundry appliances manufacturers. A friend needs the lot for a new house and wanted to go with Smeg but the latest reviews are a bit scary. Any recommendations?
TIA
Recommended manufacturers for kitchen appliances.
dosada on 18/11/2016 - 09:32
Comments
Asko
depends on your budget
Bosch is great value for money.
Smeg is overpriced and unreliable, I wouldn't call it Italian rubbish but I would never buy one.
Asko was good, but these days, I'm not sure as they moved production to a cheaper country.
So Bosch is my recommendation for value for money.
If you had money to burn, then Miele, Siemens, AEG, basically anything German.
There is better than Miele, but the prices are 'if you have to ask, you can't afford it'.
I will never buy a Bosch whitegoods again. Maybe I wasn't lucky.
I had a Bosch refrigerator which motor stopped working in the first year just before the warranty expired. The fridge was replaced as spare motor couldn't be sourced within agreed time frame (had to buy food daily or get take aways). Then the replacement fridge failed after 3 months and the Bosch wasn't forthcoming with it. Luckily the store of purchase stepped in with a demo replacement with full warranty.Bosch fridges are cheap Thai built rebadged samsungs or whatever.
I don't consider Bosch to be real Bosches if they are made outside of Germany (with the exception of the Spanish made gascooktops which seem very good and exceptionally powerful).
If you google enough you will find bad reviews for nearly every brand. Customer reviews are important to consider but not the most important thing. Just remember that for every bad review there's probably 1000+ happy customers. Happy customers tend not to bother writing reviews online. Having said all that, customer reviews are more important for identifying design flaws and common faults, not so much reviews on reliability because that will vary so much based on usage, abuse and luck of the manufacturing draw.
As long as the chosen brand has a decent warranty period, there's not too much to be scared of.
Also your friend is better off searching for the best value product in their price range in each appliance category, not just go for a single brand for everything.
Technika…Just joking.
I'm getting a kitchen reno done at the moment and I chose a smeg upright gas oven, rangehood and dishwasher. I'll let you know how I go. (Chose smeg because parents have it at their place for > 10 years now no issues, and there's 10% cashback at the moment.)
Avoid Smeg, my boss built his home and installed all Smeg appliances. They slowly started failing one after the other.
I always have the impression that Smeg is cheap rubbish because the builders put them into the new houses.
That would be Technika or Blanco.
However they sometimes offer the option to upgrade to Smeg.
Some builders put Miele into new homes, generally higher end homes and apartments.
We have Miele Dishwasher and Dryer, expensive, yes, Good quality, absolutely. My sister has Miele oven and cooktop, she is about the fussiest person I know (major OCD :) ) she has had no issues with her Miele.
We have had Miele for years and they were fantastic. Just wasn't sure how good the recent models are as our washing machine is going strong after 20 years without ever having a problem.
Miele…
Not particularly happy with the Smeg gear in our house, installed by previous owner. Glad I didn't buy it. Bought a Miele dishwasher which is so far, so good. What sold me on the Miele over other similar stuff was their supposed 20year design philosophy. Other than that, and a bit more budget, we've had good Electrolux stuff. Dishwasher, oven, cooktop, washer.
SMEG is the worst ever. Don't buy it. I was "lucky" once to win $20K of Smeg, so I had a whole kitchen full of it, so have experienced it all.
Fridges - worst, couldn't get parts, made power bills astronomical
Dishwasher - only lasted till end of warranty and died. lots of service calls while under warranty
Microwaves - only very short lives, with multiple service calls while under warranty
Cook top and wall oven - I still have these, both needed fixing multiple times but are OK at the moment.
Bosch