As soon as I got my first job in 1985 (straight out of college), my first big purchase was a car! A brand new 1985 Toyota Corolla. I paid $10000 for it. Guess what the next big purchase was?
I rented a one bedroom furnished apartment in Hiawatha area of Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Within a week, I realized that I needed to buy a vacuum cleaner in a hurry, as the cheap carpet was turning dirty and that small space was quickly beginning to give out the feel of a Greyhound Bus station waiting room. So, I went to the only large electronics store in Cedar Rapids (It may have been called Best or even Best Buy) and picked one up purely based on the popularity of the brand: Panasonic!
I had no idea that Panasonic made vacuum cleaners. Later on, I found out that they were into every form of consumer electronics. Among the more unconventional products of Panasonic that I owned over the years – an electronic typewriter (which I had purchased in 1987, just to type up my resume, for the 2nd job) and a rice cooker! Of course, the most popular one is the cordless phone, with a built-in speakerphone and an answering machine. Over the years, I must have bought 10 such phones for myself and as gifts (especially to family in India).
The vacuum cleaner was relatively quiet and did a fantastic job with the floors: both carpeted or vinyl (no wood or tiles in those days, where I lived). Back then my most prized worldly possessions were – the aforementioned Corolla, a 19″ Sony Trinitron TV and this Panasonic vacuum cleaner. I moved from Cedar Rapids, Iowa to Ames, and then a year later to Allentown, Pennsylvania with these and a suitcase full of clothes! Over these 40 years – I lived in 5 apartments and 2 houses. Not once did this trusty little vacuum cleaner stop sucking! Along the way we bought a Dirt Devil vacuum cleaner because of the much touted hoses and nozzles that it came with. That one lasted less than 2 years and we had to get rid of it, as it started giving out a burnt plastic smell.
It’s amazing that this one from 1985 is still chugging along and taking care of the toughest cleaning jobs without a single repair in all of these 40 years! Hats off to Panasonic for making such a reliable product! I wonder if we can convince Panasonic to bring that same robustness into other areas such as – Soap dispensers in public restrooms, crumbling roads/bridges and shoring up fragile, teetering democracies! It’s worth asking, right? 🤷🏼😊
RecoveringNostalgic 