Brand names - extended warranties - disposable consumerism - tomorrow's delivery day!1

[UTUSN]

So in my ancient age, there were brand names that were like gold. Long over with, with most of them swallowing one another, just trading on a *name* now meaningless.

Been looking at a plate on a washing machine saying "10 YEARS warranty - motor drive and basket."

So, it's two years old, one of the brand names famous my entire life. Kaput. But not under the covered stuff.

I've never had a claim of any kind on anything - insurance or warranty. The only reason I pay (and pay and pay) for insurance on vehicle or whatever is that it's a law.

When I was first on my own, as a college student I trundled two blocks to a laundromat with a bedsheet crammed with laundry on my back in full public view. When I progressed to a better condition the first and nearly only "luxury" was a washing machine.

So I've taken the machines for granted all these decades and scores of years. But I'm a little p.o.- about this particular one, two years old with a couple of months, just over the company warranty.

I hadn't thought about these machines until this happened: $150 labor only; $150 one (not covered) part, about half of what the whole thing cost.

And doing the usual research and internet reviews it turns out that brands have been gobbling one another up while I wasn't looking, and one of the old time ones makes the same parts for almost all of the other ones, high end or low.

The low end one, also with a famous name from days of yore, only has a 1 year company warranty and I'm paying a moderately cheap price for 3 years extended warranty. At my age, that ought to cover it.

[Mike Rows His Boat]

1. I chatted w/a trumpster at Home Depot who insisted that Milwaukee tools are made in Milwaukee.

Until I showed him the made in China label.

People just don’t get it. We’ve been gutted like a reeled-in fish. Now hollow. Nuthin’ but cheap sloganeering and incestuous cross promotions of bs.

[sinkingfeeling]

2. I'm like you and I intend to keep those old, trusted brands as long

as I can. My cars are a 1991 Subaru and a 1999 Saturn. My Amana refridge is a 1989 model, my Kitchen Aid washer and dryer are from 1997 and dishwasher is a 1995. I have a working Curtis Mathis color console TV from 1977

However, I entering this post on a new Samsung S9+ because my S6's mother board is bad exactly 3 months after last payment, at an age of 36 months since manufacture. Built-in obsolescence.

[UTUSN]

3. Hmmm, "Amana" ... Well, you give me a spot of hope since that's the low end one coming today!1

Without knowing the pecking order of "quality", this brand was one that had carried cache with me, and now Google and the reviews inform me that it's "low end." Actually, lots of the internet reviews about *anything* are pretty blistering: For every one that praises to the skies, there are two or three saying, "This is CRAP don't buy it!"

I found out that the parts for Amana are made by the surviving brand that swallowed up the others, parts for all, whether high or low end. So I hope this will be the one to usher out my "golden" years (without having to have another one) !1 The combined warranties are only four years, after all.