African dust fills power company coffers – Which device is selling out – Economic Mail

While the market for white electrical appliances (refrigerators, kitchens, washing machines and dishwashers, ovens, stoves, hoods, etc.) is falling by more than 20% in the first quarter of this year, since no subsidy program is “running” anymore, such as “Recycle-Swap Device,” there’s a category going against the grain aided by… climate change.

BSH Home Appliances: 1.6% increase in turnover – Maintaining 1st position in Greece

The reason for clothes dryers, a not-so-cheap electrical device that was by no means the “top of mind” choice of households in our country. At least until recently.

Notably, sales of stand-alone home dryers increased by 40% in the first quarter of 2024 compared to the same period last year with unit sales reaching around 12,000 units.

African dust, mud showers, smog from uncontrolled burning of materials in fireplaces and increased humidity levels are the reasons behind the boom in dryer sales, according to market players.

In fact, as mentioned yesterday at a press event by Mr. Yiannis Gratsonis, managing director of BSH Home Appliances, the changes in climate conditions favor the sales of dryers which have an increasing trend in areas such as Northern Greece where high levels of humidity prevail, but also in Southern Greece and in Crete where the phenomenon of dust is increasingly frequent.

In the fridge the… fridges

Contrary to dryers, in the first quarter of this year refrigerators and freezers literally went into the… fridge, since the subsidy program “Recycle – Change Appliance” has ended since last October.

Through the program, 352,000 coupons were issued in the refrigerator category and 250,000 were redeemed, while in the freezer category, around 95,700 were issued and just over 51,400 were redeemed.

The sale of thousands of new devices in 2022 and 2023 has resulted in these two pricey categories seeing a drop of more than 50% in the first three months of 2024, which is expected to continue well beyond. In fact, the question for wholesalers is not how much the category will “fall” this year, but how long it will take for a new balance to be reached.

According to BSH data, in 2024 it is estimated that the category of large electrical appliances, excluding air conditioners, may decline by even more than 20% precisely because of the low sales of refrigerators.

It should be noted that in 2023 the refrigeration category was the one that pushed the domestic market of large household appliances upwards, after registering the highest growth at +21%.

The second fastest growing category was the dishwasher market with an 18% increase in sales. This is followed by the clothing care category with an increase of 16%, while appliances related to cooking, ovens, hobs, hoods, etc. saw a growth of 11%.