Some thoughts on sales people

Notice that I said people, not professionals? I am amazed at how sales people use any old argument to sell whatever product they are hawking.

Buy the local Fridge
Shopping for a Fridge the line is that Australian made is the way to go, experience with local conditions plus local support and backup. Sounds fair enough, they are built here so parts should be easy to get.

Buy an Italian Stove and Oven
After finding a nice aussie made fridge we head off to look at cook tops and ovens. Now we are told that to get Quality you must buy imported. Apparently the local stoves are not up to scratch. For some reason the Italians know how to make the best stoves. And because they are imported you just know they are more reliable than anything made locally. What about service support? Well no problem, apparently the imported stoves are better because they are all made in the same factory and you can therefore be assured of getting spare parts. Where as the local designs are made of parts from all over the place and you can't be assured of getting spares in the future.

Keeping Clean
Of course we need a washing machine. Now we discover that the only way to go is imported, and with washing machines key features seem to be efficiency and reliability. Swedish machines are some of the most efficient machines available and they are combined a design that has not changed in 20 years. But they are also very advanced. Again being imported is good for washing machines.

Hot Water
Of course we want to have a Solar water system, surely this should be easy? Turns out that Australia led the world 30 years ago with solar hot waters and has done nothing since. There are two types of solar hot water system, flat panels and evacuated tubes. Both are technology that is over 25 years old but only flat panels are big in Australia. Evacuated tubes are more efficient- no one can tell you how much- but more expensive. Here you can really see sales lies in action. Flat panel guys say that evacuated tubes are a new technology (not true) and cost more (depends on your quotes) and are not very common (evacuated tubes are huge in china, I saw one figure that suggests 1million evacuated tube systems per year). Evacuated tubes are not local so you can't get parts (tell that to the oven sales people). Flat panel guys say the added efficiency of evacuated tubes is not worth the price premium.

Keeping cool
After all of that we needed a cool change talked to an A/C person. Seems that unlike fridges Auusies are not able to make good A/C units so imported is the way to go. Here you should pay a price premium for greater efficiently (quick question- do you use an A/C or hot water on more days per year?). Local support is not a problem for imported A/C as they are local agents. Further we should buy the expensive model because is is more advanced (unlike solar hot water where we should go with tried and proven) .