Amazon, the Brand Buster

It's probably safe to say that the average consumer can't be bothered with anything that isn't LSD. The fact that another option even still exists hurts the overall branding, if you will, of the product category.

> That is lower under extremely light loads than the best alkalines, but crosses over at a bit over 12 hours constant runtime since load has a relatively small effect on NiMH capacity, but a huge effect on alkaline capacity.

Then we've reached parity, assuming identical size and at least close-enough weight. Is size identical (or smaller for NiMH)? Last I handled some, weight seemed comparable.

Now that we have, take a look at when that happened. More importantly, take a look at when that happened at an affordable price point. Compare that to when NiMH first started gaining popularity and what the (price-competitive) capacities (and self-discharge rates) were then, keeping in mind that's what formed consumer perception.

Total elapsed time of product existence may not be the best metric for perception change, but it'll at least give you a starting point.

> Alkalines can leak corrosive electrolyte and destroy devices. This is a fairly well-known issue, but it doesn't seem like "always use rechargeable batteries so you don't ruin your stuff" is a widespread meme among the average consumer. I wonder why that is.

I can think of two reasons. The first is that a "fairly well-known issue" isn't a well enough known issue. Suppression of bad press (or word-of-mouth) is likely the impetus behind large battery brands replacing even fairly expensive ruined electronics when customers complain to them.

Secondly, the relative frequency of the two is vastly different. One ruined flashlight (or even Garmin or whatever) every few years (though I think it's really more like decade-plus) sticks in the memory much less distinctly than having ones TV remote stop working every week or having that same flashlight never work (because one only uses it occasionally, maybe not even monthly).

There's no mystery here.

That's probably true. Unfortunately, that larger mAh number is always going to tempt people. Some heavy users do go for the higher capacity with a full understanding of the disadvantages, but that's not the majority of the market.

> Then we've reached parity, assuming identical size and at least close-enough weight.

Eneloops came out in 2005. Their capacity hasn't changed, though the service life of later versions is longer and the self-discharge is even lower. The 1000 charge cycles and 75% charge after a year of the original was entirely acceptable for consumer applications. I don't see a size difference between a 4th-generation Eneloop AAA and a random Duracell alkaline, but I don't have calipers to measure precisely. NiMH batteries are heavier than alkalines, but I suspect this is insignificant in most consumer applications. Disposable lithium batteries that can substitute 1:1 for alkalines are lighter than either, with higher capacity.

I still think you're ignoring history as well as exaggerating "commonly". Even alkaline wasn't the first primary cell chemistry type. You impliy that it's trivial to add rechargeables to the existing engineering for multiple chemistries with actually similar voltage profiles, without showing how.

> a business decision rather than an engineering failure

A distinction without a difference. The engineers are there to support the business, not a future armchair critic's ideal of excellence.

> I suspect people who have numbers about this (battery makers) really don't want to disclose them.

Certainly the manufactuers don't want to disclose numbers for consumer products. However, if it were as often as you suggest, I would expect there to be numbers, after all these decades, from someone like Consumer Reports.

Also, there's a reasonable chance that industrial versions have published numbers.

> My perception that alkalines leak often comes from moderating /r/flashlight.

Is that a forum where commenters tend to report such experiences with full data (numerator and denominator, including when the numerator is zero), or are they more likely only to complain at failure?

Are they representative of the average consumer's usage patterns?

> I've also seen it in person quite a few times, mostly with devices belonging to friends or family that aren't used often.

As I mentioned, this is consistent with my own personal experience. However, because this is subject to (a weird backwards version of) Survivorship Bias, I come to the opposite conclusion.

Put another way, it's likely that some huge proportion, if not all, of alkaline batteries will leak (perhaps even catastrophically) if left sitting around long enough. The key here is "long enough". Since the vast majority of users actually remove and discard way before that point, it's too rare in practice.

Even if NiMH did not exist, not being able to operate with batteries below 1.2V wastes the majority of the capacity of an alkaline. I think that's a valid criticism of almost anything in consumer electronics. It requires a very good excuse before it should be considered acceptable.

Furthermore, anything relatively recent should be able to use NiMH as a matter of compatibility with batteries a significant minority of consumers have, and for environmental responsibility.

> Is that a forum where commenters tend to report such experiences with full data

Of course not. I suspect data like that about consumer products is not available to the public at all, though there are some scientific studies on alkaline battery leakage as a phenomenon (the first one I found was paywalled).

> Are they representative of the average consumer's usage patterns?

Probably. Regulars almost never use alkaline batteries, so when people post about that, it's usually their first post. They're not collectors, hobbyists or heavy users, but people who encountered a problem and thought "I bet there's a subreddit for that". (We have 35K subscribers)

2) It’s not a risk that exists at competitors like Walmart and Target

3) For some categories like baby food, even a low risk of counterfeit product is unacceptable