Vacuum Cleaners Discussions

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2007/11/04/cndyson104.xml

Results on year to December 2006 :-

• Profits up 19 per cent to £115m
• Sales up 9 per cent to £514.7m
• R&D spend increased, up £20m to £70m

Hello M00seUK:

If I recall correctly, maybe not, the nix on dyson's school at the particular location of interest in the UK was due to environmental issues and concerns by the local governmental authorities.  Are these things that dyson and the locals can resolve mutually and/or deal breakers?

Carmine D.

Apparently, poor consumer spending, tanking housing market, credit crunch, and weak and failing financial institutions are not limited to the USA.  Europe, Japan, and the UK are experiencing the worse economic downtown in recent years, from what I read. 

Here in the USA, the threat of the "R" word has gotten so bad, the Fed Chairman, Ben Bernanke, made a very public official announcement yesterday that the Federal Reserve will lower rates to stimulate the US economy.  Probably in response to the rumors that a key interest rate in the UK may be dropped one whole point [sounds like a drastic move].  And this being an election year in the US too.

Maybe these above facts and circumstances are the reason, in part, dyson has been silent and absent in the news about its financial results.  First time in 5 years that dyson has not been very public and outspoken about the success and sales of dyson vacuums.  Is the "honeymoon" over?  Have to wait and see.

Carmine D.

With high interest rates and consumer spending at a low surely anywhere US, Europe and the UK this will hit most businesses if consumers are not spending including Dyson!  This does not mean or indicate 'honeymoon' period is over!?  Consumer are just watching what they spend at present.  Once interest rates are lowered etc the consumer will start to slowly spend again!

DC18

Is the honeymoon over?  Hardly.

.

Dyson is a widget man first and vacuum man second.  Dyson is an inventor by nature and so expect better vacuum widgets and non vacuum widgets (presumably).        DIB

Let's recap the last 5 years for dyson so there is a valid frame of reference for comparisons.

If my memory serves me correctly, this is a financial data synopsis for dyson. 

In the first full year of dyson sales in the USA [2003], dyson captured about 10 percent of the market of new vacuum sales by dollars.  Not the best indicator for vacuum sales and not the industry standard, which typically measures units sold, not dollars.  But this is the matrix dyson used for publicity, so I'll stick with it.

Over the subsequent 3 calendar years, the dollar volume of dyson sales by market share climbed, along with the new prices of the dyson vacuums.  By 2006 dyson claimed about 20 percent of the market share in new vacuums by dollar sales volume. 

In April 2007, the last date for which the vacuum Forums posted dyson supplied financial data, a sales chart published in the US News and World Report magazine and provided by NPD showed percentages of market share for vacuums for the first quarter of calendar year 2007.  According to the NPD source, dyson claimed about 24 percent.  But the information was unclear, nebulous and uncertain.  When I asked both sources [US News and World Report and NPD] to validate the facts and assumptions supporting the data neither did.  US News and World Report referred me to NPD and NPD did not answer my emails.  3 months worth of data, even if it could be validated for accuracy by the sources, is meaningless and useless.

Dyson vacuum market share by sales volume in the UK declined from 2004 to 2005 by almost 7 percentage points.  In 2004, dyson claimed a 42 percent share of UK vacuums by sales volume.  In 2005 the percentage dropped to 35.  This was the year of the infamous dyson contra rotating washer which industry sources said amounted to 1900 units before returns.  Dyson countered with 5000 as the number.  But when asked to validate the number, dyson was conspicuously silent.  But dyson was disturbed by the decrease in market share of vacuums in the UK.  And, no further dyson data for vacuums in the UK was provided in subsequent years that I am aware of [at least on the vacuum Forums].

Please fill in any gaps and/or add clarification.

There is a huge caveat with all the above data.  Dyson is privately held and is not required to disclose publicly its results of financial operations as most vacuum companies are.  The above dyson data is "unaudited" by an independent authoritative source for accuracy and validity.  It is supplied and verified solely by dyson insiders.

Carmine D.

I'll just say that Dyson had a tremendous 2007..............   

CarmineD wrote: 

My personal indicator for judging Dyson's successes would be how much value by way of new inventions they can add to their moulded plastic / twisted metal components, the implied benefits and how much they can convince people to pay for the end result. Units sold comparisons are generally meaningless in all premium goods sectors that I can think of, unless you're directly comparing with products of the same selling price.

CarmineD wrote:
I'm not sure of the finer details - Google News search is proving a pain to use at the moment. I understand that they still needed to address the concerns as before and that there was a public consultation in March of last year.

Hello M00seUK:

You're perspective on personal product and company success is very different than financial success.  But welcome.  I like to see the numbers myself. 

Carmine D.

CarmineD wrote:
T'is true. If Dyson was a public quoted company, I'd agree that the financials would be different.