I’m a second generation Consumer Reports subscriber. My dad subscribed to and relied on Consumer Reports more than fifty years ago and I’ve been subscribing to it for decades, using its product and service evaluations to inform my own shopping. It’s not the only source I use: nowadays it’s a heckuva lot easier to research prospective purchases than it used to. Today the problem is more one of understanding how to read reviews than it is one of finding reviews.
In the current July issue of Consumer Reports there’s a special focus section on kitchens: counters, floors, appliances. One of the things they’ve done in the section is to single out the worst of class products. In reading that section it occurred to me that somewhere in America there’s a kitchen with a Viking Professional refrigerator, a Miele Optima dishwasher, a Kitchenaid Architect Series range, a Daltile Cliks tile floor, and a bamboo counter whose owner is probably feeling a little peculiar right about now or doesn’t realize what he or she is in for.
Yeah, I love my consumer reports.
Consumer Reports might as well be called Automotive Reports. Their focus on cars is so pronounced as to be absurd. I’d be much more likely to subscribe if they broadened their range a bit.
I no longer trust them. Here is the thing that may not be obvious, even to dedicated readers, who do not cross-check their selections:
They often have a “missing middle” in their model selections.
They’ll show you the low-end appliances, and they’ll show the high end models, but the “sweet spot” (good price for good features) isn’t there. I’ve seen it in stoves, refrigerators, computers, …
I suspect it is collusion. It’s hard for anyone to be rigorous for a century. Sooner or later they’ll take the suggestion of the manufacturers and push a little bit up-scale.
Maxwell,
The website is a bit more balanced than the magazine IMO.
JP,
I just looked at stoves (on the website) and they rate 90 models priced between $400 and $3200 dollars with most falling in the middle of that range.
One of my frustrations involves tires – most of them simply aren’t available in my area unless I order from the internet.
As always, people should be wary of basing buying decisions on one source. I think CR generally provides really good advice but one shouldn’t rely on it exclusively, especially for something expensive and long-lasting like a car or major appliance.
I don’t know Andy. I cycled out a bunch of things over the course of a year: refrigerator, range, washer/dryer. While CR had the brands I bought, they didn’t review the models.
Now, part of the problem might be that there are so many models, even by one manufacturer, but I noticed a bit of a “jump” between the model I chose and the “next up” in the CR (magazine) reviews.