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At KBIS, LG Appliance Portfolio Aims to Upgrade Consumer Experience

LG - KBIS show -LG Craft Ice Making refrigerator - Featured Image
LG's craft-ice-making function in action

LG shone a spotlight on several product categories within its mass-premium-market-targeted appliances line at February’s virtual KBIS show – namely, refrigeration, cooking, dishwashers, laundry, floor and air care.

Brandt Varner, VP of Product Management, enumerated the various feature additions for each, which included multiple enhancements to LG’s step-up STUDIO line.  Here are a few highlights from his presentation:

• Updated side-by-side refrigerators with redesigned water dispensers featuring the same UVnano bacteria-killing technology as in LG water purifiers.

• 23 percent larger InstaView panels on the refrigerators, making for an additional cubic foot of usable interior space. The InstaView panels enable consumers to see what’s inside without opening the door (Varner said a family of five typically opens a fridge door 60 times a day).

• The addition of craft-ice-making capability via the Dual Ice Maker feature on Door-in-Door InstaView side-by-side refrigerators (shown in image).

• On the redesigned slide-in range line, the addition of the same InstaView capability as on the refrigerators (i.e., the ability to look inside the oven by tapping the front, without opening it).

• The ProBake Convention feature, providing professional-style convection performance.

• In the LG STUDIO brand, a dishwasher that operates at a 39dB noise level.

• The LG STUDIO WashTower single-unit design, signaling the line’s move into the laundry category. This single-unit, front-load vertical laundry solution takes up half the floor space due to its stacked nature. It features Artificial Intelligence Direct Drive (AT DD) sensors that detect a fabric’s attributes and load size and runs through a series of algorithms to pick the appropriate settings. A “smart pairing” feature enables the washer to “talk to” the dryer to optimize the latter’s performance when clothing is transferred to it.

• The LG STUDIO Styler Steam Closet, which brings a new, wider width to the category at 24 inches. It refreshes, deodorizes and sanitizes clothing with steam.

• A version of the LG CordZero A9 Kompressor vacuum due later this year with a new Auto Empty Station that automatically empties debris from the vacuum into a bag behind the Station.

• The LG’s PuriCare Air Purifier line tower units, which will feature clean boosters, helpful in larger rooms, and will operate at a low-noise level of 25dB.  

The company also detailed its LG Proactive Customer Care (PCC) technology, which works across LG appliances of all stripes. It ties into a free service that gives customers a heads-up on potential issues early enough so they can be addressed, providing maintenance tips and preventive alerts.