[Mimmy]

By that logic, the following industries would not exist: automotive, furniture, computer, kitchen appliances, other home appliances, television, bicycle...

The article itself and mikeyouse's comment explain the situation most clearly. Standard PE financial (over)-engineering was the primary cause of their problems.

Slowing sales obviously don't help, but changes in the macro-environment can typically be weathered if the companies' financials are appropriately managed.

[makeitdouble]

> automotive, bicycle

They're supposed to have recurring maintenance fees. One might do the maintenance themselve, but a significant part of the user base will ask a shop to do it, probably the dealer where they bought it.

> furniture, kitchen appliances, other home appliances

On the higher end it survives by charging years worth of purchase. Like a 4000 bucks oak dining table. Kitchen appliance also either cost an arm and a leg or won't last for 10 years (including buying replacement for the perishable parts)

The lower end is the market IKEA dominates.

> television

They exactly saw this problem front and center and started pivoting to selling viewing data and pushing ads, getting "smart"

> computers

That's exactly why companies (the biggest cmputer purchasers) are led to leases instead of purchases, and those renew every 3 years. On the user side cheaper computers are also the mainstream, and people don't expect those to last 10 years.

[juve1996]

I completely disagree with your examples. Cars have massively changed over time - even in short intervals, cars today offer a lot of value you wouldn't get even just 5 years ago in many models. And they're priced accordingly. Computers? Laptops got smaller, graphics improved, performance improved, etc. And still is. Televisions went from CRT to LCD, SD to HD, to OLED. There were continual reasons to upgrade.

The instant pot is like the Bialetti Moka pot - it's a simple device, that doesn't wear down quickly and isn't used enough to wear it down quickly. New devices don't differentiate nearly enough. And the used market is likely flooded with cheap ones that others stopped using.

[michael1999]

All of those are examples of very challenged industries. Car dealers are scared of EVs because of the lack of maintenance revenue - many of them will fail. Most computer retailers went bankrupt (remember Gateway?). Kitchen appliances have been engineered down to break in 10 years. Televisions are down to 2 or 3 panel manufacturers. The bike business is famously broken.