Are Russell Hobbs best avoided?

Suckit

I have bought three kettles and 3 toasters in less than 4 years.
All Russell Hobbs and all failed relatively quickly.
The first two were bought as a set and were cheap enough. The Toaster stopped working, I changed the fuse in the plug it made no difference. Brought it to the recycle centre. Shortly after that the kettle stopped working. Same thing.
I put it down to them being cheap. I bought a new Kettle €26 and Toaster €24. Not the most expensive again, but I would have thought that they would have lasted longer than a year.
Third time, I decided it might be better to pay a higher price and get something decent. So in April, i bought a kettle for €67 and the Toaster was €42.
Less than a year later, the Toaster will not stay depressed I have changed the fuse and it made no difference. The kettle will only boil at random. It heats to roughly 75°C and then cuts out. Then at random, some 20 minutes later it will finally boil.
I have emailed Russell Hobbs, they do not reply.
Are they just generally cheap crap that is best avoided?
Getting one those kitchen taps that flow boiling water is not an option. Is there such thing as a good kettle and toaster or am i just going to have to buy a new one nearly every 12 months?

fepper

Morphy Richards would be in the same category,useless, got a Philips kettle and no problems since

Suckit

Yeah, I was looking at Philips. I think i might go with them.

coylemj

Beware of so-called 'heritage' brands, they are typically old and trusted brand names that were purchased off the shelf and which now carry no particular guarantee of quality. They're usually now manufactured in China.

Examples include Nordmende, Morphy Richards, Russell Hobbs, Bush, Blomberg, Grundig. None of them now manufactured by the original company. Arcelik (who manufacture under the 'Beko' brand) purchased the Blomberg brand in an attempt to move upmarket and fool people into thinking they're buying German quality.

cml387

coylemj wrote: »

Beware of so-called 'heritage' brands, they are typically old and trusted brand names that were purchased off the shelf and which now carry no particular guarantee of quality. They're usually now manufactured in China.

Examples include Nordmende, Morphy Richards, Russell Hobbs, Bush, Blomberg, Grundig. None of them now manufactured by the original company. Arcelik (who manufacture under the 'Beko' brand) purchased the Blomberg brand in an attempt to move upmarket and fool people into thinking they're buying German quality.

All true, but so are Philips.

I would think that any electrical brand you can think of is now made in China, unless it is really prestige stuff like Neff or B & O

jomalone14

DeLonghi all the way for me......I have a kettle and toaster which are both now 16 years old and still going strong. You get what you pay for.

Suckit

I found out the hard way. 
I had not realised that they had all pretty much gone to pot (excuse the pun).
I looked around today and went through a few forums all the above mentioned negatively, are pretty much spoken about in the same tone everywhere. Some even speculating that the are all made in the same place and only have contracted to have different "shells" (i cannot remember what the poster called the outer part of the kettles and toasters).
Wow. I never realised that when i had to keep up with technology, it also included toasters and kettles .
Could have saved myself a couple of hundred euro.

Suckit

jomalone14 wrote: »

DeLonghi all the way for me......I have a kettle and toaster which are both now 16 years old and still going strong. You get what you pay for.

Wow..
I have looked around and i have to admit i never really noticed them. I think i might have heard of them
 before, but i did not remember.
They have great reviews everywhere. I even found a French review and used google translator.
De'Longhi apparently.
Some of their lower end stuff does not seem to get good reviews when it is priced above €50 or €60, but that is the proper way to review things i think.
It only gets good reviews when it is priced accordingly. That seems to have been forgotten in Ireland and others, in the past few years.

bajer101

I would never have rated Russell Hobbs as a premium brand, but last year I went to buy a Steam mop in powercity. Bought a Zanussi first and that failed within hours. Brought it back and exchanged it for a Vax. That also failed within days. Brought that back and the chap in powercity recommended the Russel Hobbs. He said they had no returns. It has served me very well for the last year and has been lent out a few times and is still working well.