MONEY COMMENT
Useless Gadgets & Wasted Money

By Jane Mack (TMFJane)
September 17, 2003

Hands up if you've got a fondue set languishing on top of a kitchen cupboard somewhere? Mine's in the shed - still in its box from when it was given to us as a present at least ten Christmases ago.

According to research published earlier this week by the insurance group, Esure, about 3.8 million of us have got a fondue set gathering dust. It's just one of the gadgets that we've spent an estimated £3.2 billion on only to find that they're not nearly as useful or convenient as first thought. The fondue set accounts for £114 million of that alone. I mean, when was the last time you went to a fondue party?

The sandwich maker comes top of the list of rarely used gadgets followed by the electric knife and the foot spa. And let's not forget the ice cream, pasta and bread makers which are all taking up space in our homes. They all sound like the sort of thing you'd see on a wedding list.

What an incredible waste of money.

Of course, the purpose of Esure's research is to point out that we may have a lot of possessions in our home that we've forgotten about but they still need to be insured. My purpose in writing about it is if you don't use it then lose it. There's bound to be some other mug who is lured by useless gadgetry who'll buy it from you at a car boot fair or from a charity shop. That way you'll only need to insure the worthwhile contents of your home and your kitchen won't be full of white elephants.

Let's face it, if you had a fire in your kitchen, they're hardly the sort of things you'd rush out to replace so why buy them in the first place?

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