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Let's make quality the norm again

forbrukerradet.no

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Re: Let's make quality the norm again

#61

Post by altern8 »

dakolli wrote: post #52
altern8 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's just my opinion, man. If you think that the Chinese make great stuff, buy it. I don't have a Twitter account.

Most of my "smart" devices are Chinese. Huawei creates superior products than most western/korean/japanese counterparts. I would prefer everything I own is Chinese, the quality is superb.

Absolutely! Enjoy.

I don't buy anything that has "smart" features, either. For instance, appliances that come with an app I just immediately skip.

That might be why I'm not seeing all this superb quality.

Re: Let's make quality the norm again

#62

Post by eru »

altern8 wrote: post #35
eru wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where are you going to shop? And how do you know something is the 'Chinese version'? It's not like for example Apple advertises where they assemble their products. For a concrete example, we get very good rice varieties specifically from certain parts of China. (But here in Singapore people also really care about rice. You generally can't buy good and fresh rice in the middle of the Polish countryside for example.) A…

I either look at the label or do research beforehand. I buy from all kind of places. I wasn't thinking of agricultural products, but rather anything manufactured. As an example, appliances made in Germany will have a cord long enough that you can actually plug into the wall, while the one that's made in China will have a useless 10-centimeter cord that would force me to use an extension. Your mileage might vary, this…

We are happy with our Miele appliances (washing machine, dryer, dish washer.) But we also have plenty of Chinese stuff that works well.

I've recently had kids, and I'm actually impressed at how much toys have improved in quality since I was a kid growing up in Germany. And, yes, most of these new toys come from China etc. By and large, they seem to be sturdier and last a lot longer, and are cheaper, too.

I'm especially impressed by the light-up shoes we bought. I guess you can blame that on general improvements in LEDs and battery technology in that specific case, maybe.

For what it's worth, I now live in Singapore, and we are very open on trade, so as a consumer you benefit from especially brutal competition.

Re: Let's make quality the norm again

#63

Post by j1elo »

epolanski wrote: post #2

There's few things where the drop in quality is astronomical, one of them being clothing. Clothes used to last a life time till few decades ago. Right now you buy stuff that after the first wash already looks worn out, terrible or starts falling apart. Major known brands are guilty of this too, often regardless of price. So people end up with closets filled of junk that they look terrible in anyway. I wish there was…

Clothing is also a bit of a special thing. Some people will just get bored or tired of wearing the same trousers or the same old coat every year during 10 years. So it is simply not worth it to spend a mini fortune on a great quality one.

This tends to happen more when one is young. Growing older usually means that a good old dusty 15 years great quality coat is seen as it being perfectly ok. I guess that's also what provides that feeling that some people when they approach middle age they "always look the same"... It's not cheap to have a large and varied wardrobe and at the same time filled with high quality garments.

Re: Let's make quality the norm again

#64

Post by DanielHB »

myrmidon wrote: post #49

I personally see two effects that are very detrimental here: 1) "Quality brands", where you pay a premium to get high quality/durability products, are economically incentivized to "sell-out" (cash in the brand name by producing as cheaply as possible). This is because customers take some time to catch on, and short-term financials are too often more important than anything else. 2) Increasing trend towards no-name pr…

> "cashing out" on good brands a universally bad decision.

For the company yes, not for the executive bonuses.

It is quite notable how the long-lasting companies that are household names somehow managed to resist this urge. Most of them are private.

People need to compartmentalize things in order to make sense of the universe, but doing so for companies (and governments) is just counterproductive.

Whenever you think about a company to draw any good conclusions you always need to think about all the people who work there, from the factory worker to the executive.

Re: Let's make quality the norm again

#65

Post by scrlk »

dtech wrote: post #43
scrlk wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The share of household spending on clothing has gone from 10%+ to under 5% in Western countries. When you're spending that much, it's not a surprise that clothing was "BIFL" both in quality and upkeep (repair rather than replace). The overall revealed consumer preference has been "more and cheaper", not "less and higher quality", which still exists as a niche if you are willing to go down the tailoring route, not off…

The thing is mainly there are no quality options available. It's mostly all cheap shit or slightly more expensive, but still equally shit. So how can this reveal preference if there are no options? I would argue the surge in vintage clothing ecosystems is an indication there is an unmet demand.

You can still go to a tailor and commission jackets, trousers and shirts, made with the same quality of fabrics and manufacturing techniques. With shoes, you can still go and buy hand welted shoes.

It all comes at a price but I don't disagree that we have a barbell problem here (ie cheap fast fashion or bespoke, with nothing in the middle).

Re: Let's make quality the norm again

#66

Post by Saline9515 »

stabbles wrote: post #26

With sufficient competition, the incentives of companies would change if consumers would be willing to rent instead of owning products. Then planned obsolescence is not to their benefit.

Most cars are rented nowadays and they are less durable than ever. It's better for the manufacturer to lease and then get you to upgrade periodically to keep you as a novelty-seeking consumer.

Long warranty is better as there is no other incentive who has to pay if the product breaks down. Cars should have a 7 years warranty by default for instance.

Re: Let's make quality the norm again

#67

Post by mathgeek »

stabbles wrote: post #26

With sufficient competition, the incentives of companies would change if consumers would be willing to rent instead of owning products. Then planned obsolescence is not to their benefit.

Planned obsolescence is absolutely to the benefit of corporations if those goods are being rented. Non-durable goods are inherently profitable to rent out at above the cost of outright ownership, because then the companies involved can double dip on the consumers paying the costs of producing the good as well as claiming depreciation on the good the company still technically owns. It's a similar concept to why owning durable goods and renting them out to consumers is so viable.

I imagine you're looking at it from the avenue of "if those goods last longer, they can be rented for longer", but having to manage and store more durable goods after consumers have moved on to newer and better things is a considerable cost. A good that has to be returned is often better discarded, from the company's point of view.

Re: Let's make quality the norm again

#68

Post by maxglute »

piker wrote: post #3

While it does relate to price discovery--i.e., some folks just aren't willing to pay for an additional unit of quality at 10x--my theory is that the decline in quality is another hidden form of inflation. Thing continues to cost X even though regulations have increased costs Y, ship production to China and scrimp on the inputs. (Or have market forces do that for you.)

Well skimpflation, with caveat that a remarkable amount to R&D is spend into value engineering to lowest price points, like you don't get to 50 cent FOB tshirt trivially. And frankly it's revolutionary - enabling developing country wages to buy clothing on a single day wage.

That said, it's 2026... if you want quality and only want to pay marginal increment, there's tons of Chinese ODMs turn direct to consumer, i.e. Quince. They'll sell you functionally top quality (spec for spec inputs if not better) with 1x markup vs 10x brand markup/premium.

Re: Let's make quality the norm again

#69

Post by stabbles »

matsemann wrote: post #56
stabbles wrote: post #26

With sufficient competition, the incentives of companies would change if consumers would be willing to rent instead of owning products. Then planned obsolescence is not to their benefit.

I do think our consumer rights in Norway help a bit on this (the article is a page to the consumer agency here). We have 5 years mandated "warranty" on almost all purchases. Which means selling a cheap blender that breaks after two years, you as a shop/producer/importer have to eat the cost to provide a new one if it happens. Which means that the chance of something breaking becomes priced in, so you can't really get…

5 years is great, but I'm sure in Norway they advertise "no flip" / "no turn" / "single-sided" mattresses as a feature too ;)

Re: Let's make quality the norm again

#70

Post by Saline9515 »

eru wrote: post #47
pknomad wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How so? Any sort of profession that warrants high quality service requires certifications (bar exam, USMLE, PE, etc) Same goes for products too. It’s not a reasonable solution for the consumers to perform an exhaustive research to get high quality guarantee. I don’t find non official third party all that compelling. See Amazon marketplace as an example.

My local coffee shop makes excellent coffee. They don't need get a third party certification for me to to believe that. Similarly for eg a local carpenter. Or my tailor. The bar exam merely tells you that someone is legally allowed to be a lawyer or some such. They don't tell you, if she's any good. I don't know what USMLE or PE are. > Same goes for products too. It’s not a reasonable solution for the consumers to pe…

I don't know how it is in your country but carpenters are required to be trained and to insure their works for a decade in France, for instance.
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