We get lots of pitches from manufacturers of the types of products we sell, hoping that we will consider offering their product at our web sites. Our profile online is pretty high, so a lot of sales people find us.
We have flashlights as one of our product offerings, and a number of interesting products have recently crossed my desk.
Evaluating these products inevitably led to the question “what makes a good flashlight?”. After years of no real changes in the incandescent lamp/alkaline battery combination, we have recently seen a number of innovations in flashlight design. Some are great, but others won’t be with us for long.
Most of the recent samples I have seen use the new LED lamp technology. The cost of LEDs has continued to go down even as their brightness has increased.
LCD flashlights offer longer battery life, longer lived, more durable lamps and the potential for decreased weight. Even with all these potential advantages, some manufacturers just don’t seem to be able to get it right.
One example comes from Energizer-their Hardcase Line. For starters, there was more plastic in the package than there was in the flashlight. No exaggeration. It was heavy plastic too. The kind that costs real money. The flashlight was attached to the package with 50 lb. wire ties, so I had to have wire cutters just to get it loose from its holder. Two strikes against them, and I hadn’t even held the thing yet.
The package included two batteries (Energizer, of course) which were supposed to clip into two separate holders on the package. They had come loose in transit and were rolling around in the bottom of the box.
Ok. Now it was time to put in the batteries. It only took three of us about ten minutes to figure this one out. Maybe its just me, but I don’t believe that most people expect square-shaped fittings to be threaded. The packaging had no information regarding how to install the batteries and the cap on the back of the body of the flashlight was square. It just did not appear like a screw-off fitting.
Once the batteries were in, we turned the light on and it did have pretty good brightness. However, Energizer, the maker of the batteries, claims right on the package the this flashlight has a run time of 17 hours. This is terrible. The LED flashlight we have been selling for a couple of years will run continuous 7 days on one set of batteries.
Finally, the flashlight had a couple of totally useless brushed metal plates on the side, held in place with steel hex head screws. These add weight, but must be very expensive, and I can see no way that they would actually add durability to the flashlight.
Back to the drawing board, Energizer!
Next time, I will discuss what makes a good flashlight worth the cost.
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