Electrolux Home Products has begun affixing ‘Australian Made’ stickers to a variety of major kitchen appliances in its Kelvinator, Westinghouse and Chef ranges. These three brands currently manufacture refrigerators, freezers and cookers at plants in Orange, in New South Wales, and Dudley Park, in South Australia.
Here is Electrolux Home Products managing director John Brown, via a media release:
As an Australian manufacturer having had 15 years of no tariffs, the economics are fundamentally running against us. And today’s consumers are far more pragmatic and won’t buy Australian-made products simply because they’re built in Australia by Australians.
To survive, let alone prosper, in the modern marketplace, you have to be competitive on quality, features and price. So the fact that these brands have done this against an increasing number of cheap imports is a tribute to the skills of the people who design, develop and produce them here in our factories.
Electrolux claims that between 30 and 40 per cent of all refrigerators, freezers and cooking appliances sold in Australia are either Kelvinator, Westinghouse or Chef branded.
More than 1,000 Australians are employed in the two Electrolux manufacturing plants and adjoining research and development centres, supported by product designers and marketers in the company’s head office and design studio in Mascot, Sydney.
The refrigeration plant makes fridges and freezers bearing the Westinghouse and Kelvinator brands, which, together, account for one-third of all fridges and freezers sold in Australia.
The company’s cooking plant makes freestanding and built-in ovens and stoves bearing the Westinghouse and Chef brands which, together, comprise nearly 40 per cent of Australia’s total cooking products sales.
In addition to the Australian Made brands, Electrolux Home Products also markets the Simpson, AEG, Dishlex and Electrolux brands in Australia.