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Market Research

Topic: Electric Kettles

Electric kettles are basically kettles designed to use an outlet to heat water rather than a stove. They are generally faster at boiling water than regular kettles, only about 2–3 min on average for one liter, whereas stove kettles boil one liter within 4 minutes but are able to heat to much higher temperatures. The ability to quickly boil water makes for a fast coffee or tea for those in a hurry, and the fact that the kettle is electric means it allows a litte more versatility and portability than regular kettles which require a stove or open flame. Therefore, the target consumer is most likely to be those with little time to cook and need a quick start to their day, such as working class folk or college students who want to eat ramen.

In terms of history, kettles may have originated 3500–2000 BC in ancient Mesopotamia as bronze vessels with spouts used for removing impurities in the water via boiling. They could also be found in ancient China and early Northern Europe. Kettles for most of history were made of iron or copper, with chinese kettles trending towards porcelain. The first electric kettle was invented in 1891 by the Carpenter Electric Company, which took 12 minutes to boil. The first fully automatic kettles were developed in 1956, which helped bring the teapot into the modern era.

Electric kettles are most often made out of stainless steel or glass, but can also be made out of porcelain and high temperature plastic. All these materials are sturdy and decent insulators, which means they do not conduct heat well, which is good when you want to keep most of the heat inside the kettle, and also when you don’t want your consumer getting 2nd degree burns.

The heating element used to warm the water is often a coil plate made of high resistance metal. Metals with high resistance are good at preventing electron flow, which means when current tries to move through the material, electrons are more likely to “bump” into atoms and give them energy. This energy is radiated in the form of thermal energy to the water in the kettle. Electric kettles tend to have water directly in contact with the heating element, and most opennings are shut off to prevent heat from easily dissipating into the environment. These features allow for quicker heating.

Electric kettles have a built in thermostat (typically a bimetallic thermostat) that is used to automatically switch the kettle off when water is boiling so that they don’t keep burning indefinitely. It consists of two metal plates bonded tightly together, one of which expands to heat quicker than the other. The thermostat is usually curved in one direction, but when heated to a certain tempertature, it will snap into the opposite direction due to metal expansion difference between the two plates. This pushes a lever which trips the circuit and removes current from the heating element. There are other more complicated thermostats that can detect more precise temperatures.

TL;DR: When plugged in, current runs through a high resistance coil that heats up, in turn heating the water around the coil which convects until the water is boiling. In order to automatically turn the kettle off, the boiling steam will be pushed down a tube where the heat of the steam will trigger a special thermostat to cut the circuit.

I visited a total of 5 stores, 3 of which (Walmart, Target, and Kohl’s) offered a decent selection to choose from, the other 2 having only one item. Menards and Costco only had one kettle brand on display (which makes sense as they are primarily home improvement or grocery warehouses respectively). Of the stores I went to, there were a cumulative total of 10 brands on display (Hamilton Beach, Chefman, CuisineArt, Aroma, Mr. Coffee, Kitchen Smith, Krups, Farberware, Mainstays, and Bialetti), some of which had multiple products on the shelves. Hamilton Beach, Chefman, and CuisineArt were the most common. At all the stores I visited, electric kettles were found in a “kitchen & dining” aisle where they were often included alongside coffee makers, keurigs, teapots, carafes, coffee cups, blenders, mixers, and other coffee products. Most of the electric kettles were eye level or top shelf, and were generally kept together with a few exceptions, which made it easy to find the electric kettle section. Kohl’s was unique in that it displayed the products out of the box, which gave me a better idea of their form.

Work in progress

Most of my online research was contained to Amazon and Williams Sonoma (a store with a reputation for quality kitchen products). When it comes to the reviews, it seems the features that people are most pleased with are how fast it boils, how easy it is to use, whether it will last long, whether the power cord will get in the way, and how quiet it is. Most of the displeasure seems to come from faulty products such as rusting on the stainless steel, cracks in the glass, leaking when pouring, and a taste/smell of plastic or metal in the water. Some reviewers wished their electric kettle was larger or held the heat for longer. Suppose I should have looked through more sites and more products.

Electric kettles seem to be much more prominent in Europe and not so much in America. Americans often use microwaves or dedicated coffee makers to heat water and make coffee. There doesn’t seem to be much awareness of the electric kettle in American households. In terms of design, almost all kettles in the market had a “bulged cylindar” form made primarily from either stainless steel or glass with very little color. Minimalism seems to be the go-to theme for kitchen products in general. Culture seems to be transitioning to digital fairly quickly, so there are apps for everything. Automation (in terms of ease of use) also has a firm grip on what is trendy, and features such as turning off automatically help to relieve anxiety. People also like to have customizability, so some kettles are coming out with temperature settings.