Home Appliances - Online vs Offline, Delivery, Fitting and Disposal

Stephen HarmstonYour contact for Omibus
May 24, 2013, 9:58 AM GMT+0

This YouGov SixthSense Home Appliances report focuses on a number of topics. It considers online and offline shopping patterns – including an overview of purchases of small appliances and white goods. There is a running emphasis on general versus specialist retailers for both online and offline shopping, and where appropriate, comparisons between online and offline patterns are made.

It also examines consumers’ preferences and opinions relating to delivery, fitting, installation and disposal services provided by retailers and manufacturers of large kitchen appliances. In addition, it briefly looks at the uptake of extended warranties and how significant they are to consumers.

Finally, it includes a data focus on specific goods, including: dishwashers; ovens and cookers; microwave ovens; fridge freezers, refrigerators and freezers; and laundry appliances, and examines consumers’ purchasing patterns relating to each during the five years leading up to the report.

Questions were asked on the following topics:

  • Reasons for buying appliances
  • Online and offline purchases of small appliances
  • Online and offline purchases of white goods
  • Sources of information used by consumers
  • How consumers set about buying a domestic appliance
  • Use of comparison websites
  • Significant information on websites
  • Online retailers used to buy small appliances
  • Online retailers used to buy white goods
  • Consumer reviews on specialist and general retailers’ websites
  • Information on specialist and general retailers’ websites for small appliances and white goods
  • Levels of satisfaction with online retailers
  • Preferences for high street specialist or general retailers
  • The basis for these preferences
  • Advantages and disadvantages of online shopping for domestic appliances
  • Advantages and disadvantages of high street shopping for domestic appliances
  • Consumers’ preferred delivery terms
  • The significance of delivery costs in the decision to purchase an appliance
  • The amount consumers are willing to pay for delivery
  • Consumers’ preferred delivery options
  • Consumers’ preferences for delivery slots
  • Consumers’ most preferred existing delivery features
  • The significance of fitting/installation on the decision to make a purchase
  • The amount consumers would be willing to pay for fitting/installation
  • How consumers would dispose of a fully working appliance
  • Whether they would be willing to pay for disposal
  • How much they would be willing to pay for the disposal of appliances – fully working and faulty
  • The significance of disposal costs to the decision to purchase an appliance
  • The purchase of extended warranties
  • The importance of extended warranties to consumers
  • The significance of the cost of extended warranties to the decision to make a purchase.

For the data focus on specific goods, questions were asked on the following topics for each appliance:

  • Incidences of purchase
  • Most popular brands
  • Reasons for choice
  • Approximate price paid
  • Most popular types
  • Most common technological specifications
  • Most common energy ratings.

Methodology
For this report, YouGov SixthSense commissioned a survey among YouGov’s online panel, drawing on a nationally representative sample of 2,087 UK adults aged 16+ in March 2013.