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Say 10% of American households and 80% of British households buy electric tea kettles that last exactly 10 years each. That's 10 million total market in the US
by thatthatis 13y ago
Say 10% of American households and 80% of British households buy electric tea kettles that last exactly 10 years each.
That's 10 million total market in the US (100 x .1) and about 16 million in the UK (~20 x .8).
So 26 million total market with a level 1/10th per year or 2.6 million kettles per year. At 100k run per year per manufacturer, the market can then support 26 different models easily.
On the second point, It seemed that he was adding the 2x retail markup into his figures. If you'd followed the link on amazon, you'd see that $90 was market down from about $200.
Sometimes it's best to ask "what would you have to believe for this to be right" before you tear into someone for faulty analysis. All of his number easily pass my smoke tests.
- teamonkey 13y agoComing from the UK I can't believe that only 80% of households own an electric kettle. The idea of going to someone's house and not finding a kettle seems genuinely ludicrous. Not just houses - almost every break room of every business will have one. Of course, they cost quite a bit less on average in the UK.
- rgbrenner 13y agoYou just described coffee makers in the US. Tea kettles on the other hand... can't recall ever seeing one in real life.
- petercooper 13y agoMaybe the other 20% own non-electric kettles, like us, or have one-touch boiling water systems, like my parents. When our last electric kettle blew up 3-4 years ago, we decided to go with a good, old fashioned metal kettle that we use on the hob. Works well, doesn't ever break, and even makes it a bit more of an 'event' to put the kettle on as you get all the boiling sounds, the whistle going off, etc. My parents, on the other hand, have a thing that produces boiling water at the touch a button so they just use that to dump water into their mugs instead. Either way, an electric kettle is far from the only solution .
- cowls 13y agoKettle on the hob sounds so much more fun then boiling water at the touch of a button. I feel like there needs to be some ceremony to the tea making, it cant just be pored from a tap there needs to be some kind of wait preceding it.
- monkeynotes 13y agoDrinking tea in the UK isn't about the fun of the kettle. It's a matter of necessity and the whole process is utilitarian. An efficient and predictable water boiler is what is needed, not a 'fun' tea making ceremony. The English largely drink the fannings of tea leaves (poorest quality) it's not about ceremony, fun, or quality, believe me.
- petercooper 13y agoWe only drink tea when people visit, so the kettle does play a role. Being gas, it takes longer to boil, giving a nice period of often tea-related small talk before it's shrieking for mercy. If one is in an office or one drinks tea because one's addicted to it then yes, the kettle would be more of an inconvenience, but not everyone lives such fast, non ceremonial lives.
- cowls 13y agoI feel you are not embracing the tea drinking enough. I am well aware what the English drink, being one of them and all!
- rmc 13y agoMaybe the other 20% own non-electric kettles You mean those old fashioned kettles that are little more than a pot that you put on the hob? Nope. No way do 20% of UK houses have that sort of old fashioned system. That's like claiming 20% of UK houses still have outhouses and don't have indoor toilets. It always amazes me how the ridiculuous old fashioned non-electric kettles are still popular in USA.
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- DanBC 13y agoWe can buy budget kettles for £5 in supermarkets. Plastic, not nice, but functional.
- alan_cx 13y agoYeah. In fact, my current kettle cost £2.99. That was 6 ish months ago. I buy them, and treat them as throwaway. They seem to last as long as £30 ish kettles, so why bother spending more? My cheapo ones last about a year, then I just get a new one. Awful for the environment, but there you go.
- Crito 13y agoI suspect it is somewhere around 80%. It seems inconceivable to me that a US house might not have a microwave (even unfurnished apartments I rented from slumlords in college came with microwaves), but apparently many do not: http://www.eia.gov/emeu/recs/appliances/appliances.html http://www.eia.gov/emeu/recs/appliances/appliances.html
- alan_cx 13y agoNo. Microwaves are a general cooking thing, and relatively new. Not considered necessary. Tea, in the UK, is so ingrained in the culture, and has been around so long, that kettles are almost like cutlery. I can't imagine a house or business in the UK without one. Hell, you even find kettles in vans out on site. Where there is a Brit, with in about 20m, you'll find a kettle, and a tea bag. The only exception to that could well be from recent immigrants. They may not be in to tea in the same way, and may not be so wedded to the kettle. Even then, one British thing immigrants quickly pick up, possibly to help integrate, its drinking tea. In short, dont mess with the British and our tea. Oh, BTW. Im British, I can't stand tea. Nasty foul bitter bile. Who the hell likes this stuff? Surely only sadists actually like tea? I like coffee.....
- EliRivers 13y agoNasty foul bitter bile. Mnay teas are not at all bitter. Did you only try the cheap tea? PG Tips, Tetley, Typhoo, that sort of thing? The cheap stuff is horrible.
- Crito 13y agoNew or not, I literally cannot picture a home without a microwave. My best guess is that most are the homes of immigrants.
- dasil003 13y agoInterestingly I live in the UK and have neither a microwave nor an electric kettle. Incidentally, I am technically an immigrant (from the US), though not with the connotations of what I assume you were envisioning.
- eterm 13y agoThey also last 2-3 years at most ime. There was a time my old office had the kettle break every 3-4 months.
- teamonkey 13y agoYeah, but think how many times an office kettle boils compared to a household one.
- baha_man 13y ago"Overall ownership of kettles has declined from 83 per cent of the population in 2008 to 78 per cent in 2012." http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2262020/Humble-kettle-losing-steam-Britains-homes-competition-coffee-machines-hits-sales.html http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2262020/Humble-kettl...
- _mulder_ 13y agoSeems to be a confusion of terms. 80% of the population is not normally the same as 80% of households.
- thatthatis 13y agoI was pulling reasonable numbers out of the air to do an order of magnitude/what would you have to believe analysis. It's unclear from that article what "ownership" means, given that a kettle is a household-level item, I'm not sure if it would matter if you did your survey as "do you own a kettle" or "is there a kettle in your house" -- they should sum up to about the same percentage. Maybe a smaller percentage of the population would say they own a kettle than would say they have one in their house due to different interpretations of what it means to "own" something. I'd expect those differences to be within the margin of error of most surveys.
- rmc 13y agoNot to mention work places. If someone doesn't own a kettle at home, but there is a kettle at work that they use to drink tea, then they essentially are part of the UK kettle-culture.
- baha_man 13y ago"80% of the population is not normally the same as 80% of households." Sure, but I was surprised by how low the figure was. I would have expected it to be more like 90-95%.
- Thrymr 13y agoFor the sake of the previous argument, however, this hardly matters. If the fraction is 100%, then 30 models of kettles can be supported at 100k/year. This is an order of magnitude argument, not a precise census.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- orf 13y agoMore than 80% of households have a kettle in the UK, I would say 99%. That doesn't count businesses, shops or other places that will certainly also have a kettle. We do love our tea.
- __chrismc 13y agoI don't even drink tea, and I have an electric kettle. In case any guests want tea. It's the "done thing", as they say.
- skrause 13y agoI have an electrict kettle and not once though of it as a "tea making device". There are dozens of reasons I might need boiling water and it's most often used for making coffee. Another good use is dual-core boiling. When I need boiling water for cooking, I put some water in a pot and turn on the stove. But I also put water in my 2 kW electric kettle and will have boilng water within a few minutes.
- __chrismc 13y agoGood point. I've done this in the past (i.e. back when I was at university) - speed up cooking ramen noodles (or "super noodles") by pouring a boiled kettle into the hot pan. But these days my kettle is almost solely used as a stand-by "tea making device" :)
- ctz 13y agoIt's not even really about our love of tea. I think it's mainly about the US power standard being too low voltage to deliver enough power to boil water in an acceptable time.
- laurencerowe 13y agoWhile my electric kettle here is only 1kW compared to a standard 3kW in the UK, how else should one boil water for tea? It's still as fast as heating on a hob.
- vacri 13y agoDo a google image search on 'kettle' and you'll see that 26 is a laughably small number for the amount of available models. Strangely, almost all of them are pictured with their spout pointing to the left. It's a bit like a Where's Wally, trying to find one oriented for the left-handers amongst us.
- ent 13y agoMaybe it's more of a handle pointing to the right? Most people are right handed so that would make sense.
- thisone 13y agoaside from the 80% mark. 10 years is too long to assume a kettle lasting. Just bought our 3rd kettle in 7 years after the previous one developed a leak (and the one before that, the on switch liked to fall off)
- dded 13y ago> 10% of American households [...] buy electric tea kettles No way. I've never seen an electric tea kettle. Tea kettles, sure; but not electric ones. I don't believe anywhere near 10% of US households have one. We've got plenty of bread machines, waffle irons, electric skillets, toaster ovens, crock pots, and every possible variety of coffee maker, espresso machines, rice cookers, etc. So we're not adverse to electric appliances. Myself, I've got a stovetop kettle that I never use. If I want tea, I heat water in the microwave.