When my 1970's U.S. made Hoover vacuum finally developed a serious problem, I hit the stores, the big boxes, for a replacement. Here's what I found: Hoover, the long time product of North Canton,Ohio: made in Mexico. Eureka, once proudly made in Detroit, MI and Springfield, IL: now made in China and Mexico. Bissel, homegrown in Walker, Michigan: made in Mexico and South Korea.
I wasn't planning on spending $249 on a used Kirby vacuum cleaner, but I wanted a well- made vacuum cleaner made in America, made by the free workers of the free enterprise system. I'm fed up with the vacuum cleaners now sold by "American" companies like Hoover, Eureka, Royal and Bissel. They break down quickly and I'm tired of replacing them. These are prime examples of the loss of both jobs and quality products with the outsourcing done by American companies. Many of these U.S. companies lobbied hard to gain favor with Congress to pass the free trade agreements. They said they needed free trade with China and Mexico to open these markets up for their product sales. But the desperately poor and repressed workers of China and Mexico, making pennies-per-hour, could not afford to buy or had no use for these manufactured products. The Chinese and Mexican Governments just wanted international investments, not the products. The free trade agreements only opened up these repressed labor "markets." So began the U.S. economy- damaging practice of designing products in the U.S. and then signing deals with the Chinese and Mexican Governments for the manufacturing, then shipping them back to sell in America.
I also find it troubling that the "parent" company of Hoover, Royal Dirt Devil and Vax is a home consumer products giant based in Hong Kong called Techtronics (TTI). So these one-time U.S. invented, marketed, and manufactured products, competing with one another to be better and better, are now part of a multinational corporation, apparently well on it's way to monopolizing the vacuum cleaner industry.
So Kirby stands alone now as the only U.S.-made vacuum cleaner. I found my $249 used Kirby, made in Cleveland, Ohio, at small local repair shop. Kirby didn't shut the factory gates and strike up contracts with the Chinese or Mexican governments. They continue to make a sturdy product, built to last and worth every penny. I'm not buying another vacuum cleaner, ever. And when it needs service I know this local guy...
