April 2022 REVIEW ertonline.co.uk


Chicago returns as the


destination for innovation This March saw the return of The Inspired Home Show in Chicago, the first in-person event there since 2019. Sarah Selzer reports on a show with innovation at its core.


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The Inspired Home Show at McCormick Place in Chicago ran for one day less than usual this year, but is back to a four-day show in 2023. There was still plenty of innovation on show this year to make the trip worthwhile. If you haven’t visited before, it is definitely one to consider for the sheer breadth of product, inspiration and keynote speakers involved! There are numerous displays, presentations and


special pavilions around the show complex, focusing on trends or design and retail awards and before the show starts on the first day, there is a new exhibitors and trends preview. This year the theme was ‘Health @ Home’, with 90 brands showcasing. It is very much an international show, with home-


grown US brands joined by those from around the world, including Europe and Asia. Electricals has a presence throughout, but the Lakeside Wired & Well Hall is dedicated to electrical goods – anything from floorcare and beauty to grills and air treatment.


The different voltage


between Europe and the US tends to involve a discussion on volume before a US product is made available to the UK, particularly for kitchen electricals. But many brands are happy to have that discussion. The concourse area houses a Smart Home


pavilion, design and retail awards displays and an inventors revue section for entrepreneurs. The North Hall elsewhere tends to focus on design-


led electricals with brands like Fellow (top left), which describes itself as “a handful of nerds obsessed with product design”. Smart Home also found its way into the South Hall – predominantly table top and cookware


– including the UK brand, W10, with the Oxford Powercup (below), a vacuum-sealed stainless steel cup with detachable power bank for wireless charging.


The Viatek Smart Touch Trash Vac combines a vacuum cleaner and waste bin in one! Features include quiet close top with sensor cover, wheels for easy manoeuvring and a lightweight compact size (16 x 10 x 10in).


The Presto Power Bento electric cooker is


divided into two cooking areas – for ramen on one side and eggs or veggies on the other. Other nifty products include the Nomad travelling slow cooker and the gloriously-named Pizzazz Plus rotating pizza oven, alongside staples like air fryers and coffee makers.


Eating at home and consumers gravitating to ‘lockdown hobbies’, like cooking, are being cited as reasons behind SDA’s significant growth over the last two years. Market insight company, Numerator, collated


research on purchases made across different retailers, including Amazon and Aldi, and recorded on an app by over one million panellists in North America. Practice Director, Peter Greene, presented the most


recent findings at The Inspired Home show in Chicago. “Everyone experienced a change over the last two


years, eating at home became more important and this shift appears to be sticking,” he said. Since the onset of the pandemic, three in four


households purchased housewares, across multiple categories, increasing the average spend, with SDA being the largest – up 17 per cent between March 2020 and December 2021. Most categories grew, with air fryers and juice


extractors showing the most growth in household penetration from their previous position (up 14 per cent and two per cent respectively).


It is a different story when it comes to continued


usage, though. With air fryers, 86 per cent of respondents still own the product and 31 per cent use it more frequently than they did when they bought it in lockdown. With juice extractors, 41 per cent said they use it less frequently than when first bought. Mr Greene added: “Current usage varies by


category and early reads indicate that air fryers and coffee/espresso makers are here to stay, while more items with a limited scope of end use, such as juice extractors and soda makers, aren’t sticking.”


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