Appliances Online New Zealand general manager Troy Tindill.
Appliances Online New Zealand general manager Troy Tindill.
One of Australia’s most popular appliance delivery - and removal - retailers has moved into New Zealand, aiming to “disrupt” the $2.3 billion domestic appliance market.
Appliances Online, which last year topped a major consumer survey in Australia, has started operating today, with delivery services in Auckland, Hamilton, Whangārei, Tauranga,Taupō, and Rotorua. It says it hopes to expand across the rest of the country “in the near future”.
The online company’s model is based on free next-day delivery of an appliance to a customer’s home, along with free removal and recycling of the existing appliance. In other words, if the fridge is broken down, the company says it will have it replaced by the next day.
“In New Zealand, the experience of buying appliances has remained largely the same for decades,” said Appliances Online New Zealand general manager Troy Tindill. “We’re here to offer something completely different.”
The company - which offers brands including Fisher & Paykel, Miele, Bosch, Haier, and Panasonic - was last year awarded top place in an Australian Financial Review list of sustainable retailers.
Since 2005, when it launched in Australia, “the retailer has stopped 80,000 tonnes of electronics and appliances from being dumped in landfill”, reported the AFR.
A screenshot from Appliances Online's new New Zealand website.
It also topped a customer satisfaction survey by independent Australian consumer website Choice, which polled 3500 people.
“Appliances Online topped every online category in our survey,” reported Choice.
“We’ve had plenty of good feedback for Appliances Online anecdotally in recent years, and for a relatively young company [it was founded in 2005] to have gained so much ground over the past decade is an impressive thing. Though it no doubt helps that its parent company, Winning Group, has been an appliances fixture in Australia for over a century.”
The company says it has reshaped consumer behaviour in Australia. “For years, New Zealand’s appliance sector has been dominated by traditional bricks-and-mortar retailers... but with Kiwis increasingly buying high-value goods online, this market is primed for a shake-up.”
“I’m so excited to bring Appliances Online to New Zealand,” said Tindill. “Hand on heart, I believe we’re revolutionising the way Kiwis shop for appliances.”
He said the company did not outsource any of its “customer journey”.
A scan of its New Zealand website on Monday showed the retailer offering some cut-price deals - for example, up to several hundred dollars off the recommended retail price (RRP) for some fridges. Other appliances’ prices appeared to be in line with the RRP other retailers.
In announcing the move today, the company itself highlighted a 2024 study by Salesforce outlining consumers’ expectations when it came for shopping for brands - “57% of NZ consumers say poor customer service stops them from making repeat purchases from a company or brand”.
Appliances Online is part of the fourth-generation, Australian family-owned Winning Group.
Winning Group entered New Zealand in 2021, opening a 6300sq m distribution centre in Auckland, followed by the launch of its online Andoo brand in 2022.
Editor-at-Large Shayne Currie is one of New Zealand’s most experienced senior journalists and media leaders. He has held executive and senior editorial roles at NZME including Managing Editor, NZ Herald Editor and Herald on Sunday Editor and has a small shareholding in NZME.
