The other day my SO stupidly fell for the ol’ “want a room of your house cleaned free?” gambit and the next thing you know, a nicely dressed, fast talking fellow arrived with a fancy-dancy, chrome and shiney vacuum cleaner. The Kirby vacuum cleaner to be exact.
The sales pitch was perfected to an art…
Now I have never heard of a Kirby vaccum cleaner but I have to admit, it was an amazing display, I learned more about vacuum cleaners than I probably need to know and it sure did seem shiney and purdy…but even with the special, one-time-only $500 discount - the price quoted was still $1,244. I passed. I figured my mortgage, car insurance and electric bill was probably more important this month than having a nice, clean carpet.
Has anyone else had this pitch?
Has anyone actually bought a Kirby?
Can you honestly tell me it is worth over a thousand bucks?
If you’re interested in having a family heirloom, yes. I have a 10-yr-old Dirt Devil that I paid $99 for and it stills works just fine. It would be a cold day in hell before I’d pay that much for a vacuum cleaner.
My mom bought one, back in the day. Stuff started breaking on it right after the warranty ran out - she ended up writing them some harshly worded letters about how she wouldn’t recommend them to anyone, ever, and they took care of the broken stuff. We got a new vacuum about… ten years later, and I was so glad. That Kirby was the heaviest thing EVER.
I got an Oreck back in the day… what was that, about 1997; I needed a really good one 'cause I was dealing with a weakened immune system plus wicked allergies. It still works and still rocks. But it cost me less than a third (or a fourth?) of your door-to-door guy’s offer on the Kirby, IIRC. Dang. That’s extreme.
Yeah, Rainbows are that much too. Good vacuum cleaners, but I’d rather have a hundred dollar Sears upright.
The damn things are a PAIN IN THE BUTT. You have to fill up this water container, (all the dirt is filtered through the water.
And lugging the darn thing up and down stairs? I hate it. When I move to TX, I’m getting an ordinary Cyclone, or some such.
Oh, why do I HAVE a rainbow? It’s not mine, it’s the boyfriends. When we moved in together, he had just bought it. I’d already had experience with rainbows as my mom and I had foolishly bought one years before.
But he wouldn’t listen.
I don’t know about the kirby’s. But 1700 is really idiotic to ask for a vacuum cleaner.
Especially with what I’ve learned the last few weeks. Ordinarily I am a mere project manager for environmental jobs. Our company recently acquired (in order to diversify) a supply company.
The prices the dealers pay the manufacturers for stuff??? It’s criminal.
But what REALLY sucks is that WE don’t even get a discount on the stuff. GRRRRRRR.
My mom fell for the Kirby once. My parents still have it - the G4 model. It vacuums pretty well, and the drive feature is nice (self-propelling), but it’s heavy and it doesn’t have anything on it that a high-end, $300 Kenmore Progressive doesn’t, except for the metal. In my opinion, it’s not worth $1,000 or more. Buy the $300 Kenmore instead. It’s the highest rated vacuum by Consumer Reports. Not all vacuums are created equal, though - I have a $100 Kenmore Quick Clean, and it’s lacking in cleaning power and many other areas. I wish I’d spent the extra $200 while I had the money and made a better investment. Oh, and avoid bagless vacs. A PITA to empty, especially if you have allergies.
(Note: I’ve offered CR as support of a product and heated debates over the legitimacy of their reviews has ensued. I’m just offering my opinion here, and maybe we could stick with the OP in this thread, since we’re talking about vacuums and not cars? Just a thought.)
My parents bought a Kirby G4 twelve years ago for 1300 dollars. We never actually use the shampoo features, or the drapery attachments. Nor do we use the hare floor mode, or the horse hair bristle brush. We do not use the cushion cleaner, nor do we use the “crevice” attachment. We have to special order bags for the vacuums cleaner, but the bags do last a while. However, it does vacuum well.
We’ve got a Miele vacuum. They’re about $1000, but we got it when my sister was working for Williams-Sonoma so we got it super cheap. (She worked for the outlet. gotta love the scrap trucks.) So ours was maybe 100-200 dollars. It’s great on carpets and bare floors, but it is a cannister vac so it is a little heavy. Still it’s plastic so not too heavy.
-Lil
We got our carpets cleaned and I’m sure they started out with something like $3000. He kept going down, down, down until he got to $500. I would have bought the damn thing, but my wife said “no”. Boy was that salesman pissed that he’d gone down that low and still didn’t get a sale.
I know a guy who sells (or tries to) this type of carpet cleaner.
He has to do a certain number of demonstrations per month to meet his quotas, regardless of whether he sells any units or not. I let him come over and demonstrate his cleaner in my living room whenever he wants (under the strict understanding I will NEVER be buying anything from him). I get my carpet cleaned for free, he gets an extra demonstration towards his quotas. Works well for both of us.
We recently bought an Oreck. Top of the line was around $700. An outrageous price for a vacuum, but less than 1/2 what you quote for a Kirby. Has a 20 year guarantee, with free yearly overhauls.
What I like about it is that it is REALLY light. Very easy to lift and carry with just one hand. Seems to be very powerful as well. I assume the $400 model is essentially the same. The more expensive one was slightly quieter.
We were ‘sucked’ into buying one about six years ago. Paid about $1100 for it. I didn’t feel TOO bad about it since my mother has a Kirby that has been running for thirty years, needing (AFAIK) only one trip to the shop for motor repairs.
As far as pushing it goes, they now have (mine does anyway) a switch that gets it to move forward somewhat on its own, much like many lawnmowers have.
Admittedly they ARE heavy, so we have a second, cheaper vacuum that we use for the second floor of the house, since it sees much less travel.
The thing to remember about these ‘high end’ vacuums is that they are actually pulling dirt up from below the pad. By dirt I mean allergens, dust, and all that crap. Your regular 100 or 200 vac is only taking the dirt off the fibers at the top of the carpet, with very little penetration of the pile.
That being said, no way would I pay that much for any vacuum cleaner. You can find Kirbys on Ebay for $400 still in the box.
