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BoilerButtSlut t1_izpb567 wrote

Reply to comment by TheJackal927 in What makes one product cheap junk that breaks in a week and another that lasts a lifetime? by SirCheeseAlot

I'll give a simpler explanation: most consumers just don't care about durability as much as they say they do.

Here's a fun experiment you can do: ask a friend of yours how much they would be willing to pay for X appliance that lasts 20 years. I guarantee that number will be well below what that kind of appliance actually costs.

My wife's family thinks I'm insane for much I spent on my appliances even though I tell them it will last until I'm retired. And they are not poor.

Durability/longevity are one of those things that people talk about but never put their money where their mouth is.

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Potato-Engineer t1_izppxrb wrote

And let's go one step further: most consumers don't know whether the thing they're buying is durable. Sticking "durable" on the package is dirt-cheap. Actually making durable things is expensive. I'd guess that almost every consumer has, at some point, bought a thing they thought was durable, but it wasn't. Learning whether a product is durable generally takes some decent research about brands and products, and whether a particular brand just got bought by someone who just changed their quality to be much worse. We all have stories about how "X used to be good, but then they started making crap products."

So part of the question is "how durable does the consumer think this product is?" And if the consumer can't know, then you fall back on price again.

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BoilerButtSlut t1_izpuz6d wrote

My general rule is determine what features you want first. Like what features do you want as a minimum that would make you happy for whatever you buy. Then find the cheapest appliance with those features.

Then take that price and multiply it by 2-3x. That's the actual range you can expect for a durable model with those features.

It's not a perfect rule but it gets you in the general neighborhood.

But in general you will not find durability at low cost. That is a fiction.

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dildonicphilharmonic t1_izpqkhb wrote

OK boilerbuttslut, let’s hear about those appliances.

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