She's Rooting For Whirpool

  • by May 2, 2008
Interesting article on Whirlpool's suit against Kenwood in the EU. I hadn't heard about that one before. Thanks for bringing it to my attention. As a former employee of Whirlpool's KitchenAid division, I will be following the story going forward.

One minor correction, though. I can tell you definitively that Whirlpool did NOT acquire the KitchenAid brand name as part of their 2006 purchase of Maytag. Maytag is a fine company and a respected brand, but it's never had anything to do with KitchenAid (other than both of them being bought by Whirlpool, that is).

In fact, the KitchenAid brand was originally owned by commercial food processing equipment manufacturing company, Hobart. This is why KitchenAid home mixers look so much like Hobart commercial mixers, with that same distinctive round-nose profile.

When I was hired by the KitchenAid plant in South Carolina in 1982, it was still a part of Hobart. Hobart sold their KitchenAid division to Whirlpool in February of 1986. You can find a pretty good summary of the history of the KitchenAid brand name at http://www.answers.com/topic/kitchenaid-4396712?cat=biz-fin.

Otherwise, nice article! I hope Whirlpool wins. I'm still have a soft spot in my heart for that mixer's old-fashioned look.

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