We bought a new vacuum cleaner for Karen’s Mum last week, after her trusty cylinder model packed in. There were only two on sale in Morley ASDA, both a quasi-own brand called ONN. 
In the process of setting it up, we were rather alarmed that it managed to suck rather a lot of muck out of our kitchen carpet, one that had been supposedly deep cleaned & professionally shampooed recently.
Anyway, a week further on, Karen’s mum is not entirely happy with it because it is fairly heavy & hard to push. So we took over our trusty Dyson De Stijl which is an early-ish DC01 model with added HEPA filtration & a freaky colour scheme.
(De Stijl is a Dutch art movement based on simplicity and abstraction).
Consequentially, we gave her our old one and bought the new one off her, working out that it isn’t quite so hard to push when you back off the carpet pile setting, now everyone is happy. (Until she finds out how much the filters are!)
I’d also recommend James’ autobiography, it exposes the vested interests of the grubby Corporate world and is also a good read. I read the first edition and he has subsequently added to it (I caught up with the difference in the library one day, or maybe it was Waterstones…)
I’ve managed to fight with and ruin every vacuum cleaner I have ever owned!
Comment by Welshcakes Limoncello — March 9, 2008 @ 8:28 pm
My beloved is an obsessive Hooverer. Manages to blow the circuits on them. We must buy 2 a year.
I’m thinking about getting her a Carpet Sweeper instead. Are they still made??
Comment by pj — March 9, 2008 @ 10:32 pm
PJ, surprisingly, John Lewis sell them- see http://www.johnlewis.com.
I’ll bet that the odd Morley back-to-back might still have one of these as well…
Comment by Shades — March 9, 2008 @ 11:51 pm
So is the dyson really so wonderful? A friend was telling me the other day it is the next purchase on her list and she is saving like mad for it. I started to wonder about it. I hate our vacuum but luckily the old scientist does the vacuuming.
Comment by jmb — March 10, 2008 @ 12:40 am
JMB, when they were first introduced they were indeed innovative, these days less so. They are well designed & built, I don’t see the ONN lasting half as long as the DC01 did (it is more than ten years old).
Comment by Shades — March 10, 2008 @ 9:23 pm