By Patrick Avenell
SYDNEY, NSW: Although Samsung is currently in the midst of a major publicity campaign, with recent large scale launches for its TV, home theatre, digital imaging and IT ranges, and the scheduled launch next week of the Galaxy S II smartphone, whitegoods are not being forgotten, according to head of marketing Lambro Skropidis.
Samsung has big plans for its appliance categories, with French Door Fridges, Bubble Wash laundry products and a new range of NaviBots all planned for 2011.
Furthermore, Skropidis wants to significantly improve the Korean brand’s presence in the cooking category.
“We’ve got a job to do in cooking,” he said. “We believe we’ve got some good technology in the cooking space — traditionally we haven’t had enough distribution in that space — we’re having big discussions with retailers at the moment about trying to get to support cooking endeavours.”
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Another big push expected in the second half of 2011 is in air conditioning.
“Air conditioning is such a big category — over $1 billion in Australia — and if you can get some significant share there, there’s a lot of revenue to be had,” said Skropidis.
The full story on Samsung’s 2011 whitegoods agenda is in the May edition of Appliance Retailer magazine.