Hustle East Africa Magazine interviews Sam Odhiambo, head of Consumer Electronics at Samsung. Excerpts below.
- Tell us About the Bespoke Home range of Consumer Electronics
When the Bespoke line was first introduced in 2019, Samsung Electronics wanted to reimagine the role home appliances play in a household, both in appearance and function. Later, Bespoke would expand into more kitchen appliances and then the rest of the home with living appliances, introducing more color and material options. The team behind Bespoke’s designs decided that a continuous cycle of new colors for Bespoke appliances would make it easier for users to find the design that best reflected their unique lifestyle. For users who may find deciding on home décor daunting, in 2021, Samsung introduced the Bespoke AI Recommendation service in Korea. This service helped make appliance designing more accessible with the help of AI. Users would upload photos of their homes or designs they liked, and the AI would analyze the images to come up with color recommendations that fit best in that environment. You can read more about it here.
- What is the major difference between Bespoke Home and the other Samsung range of Consumer Electronics?
The meaning of the word Bespoke is customization. At Samsung when we say Bespoke we mean encompassing the latest trends of modularity and personalization in the home, with electronics that can be customized to suit individual styles and storage needs. The Bespoke range of consumer electronics offers the home owner an opportunity to style their home in a way that reflects their personality as well as required functionality. The Bespoke range started with the Bespoke refrigerators in 2021 and has more recently evolved to Bespoke Home that has everything from Refrigerators, ovens, washing machines and many more
- Is the Kenyan market ready for luxury consumer electronics?
A report by Henley & Partners and New World Wealth ranked Kenya only second to South Africa in the luxury market, noting that hotels, lodges, cars, private jets and classic jewellery are big sources of private wealth. This means that indeed Kenyan’s are ready and already consuming luxury consumer electronics. The recently concluded Luxury Living and Design Expo hosted at the Village market is a testament to that. As Samsung the Bespoke refrigerator has done quite well in the Kenyan market and we hope that the 2022 range will do even better.
- What has the uptake of the Bespoke range been in Kenya compared to the rest of Africa?
In Kenya we introduced the Bespoke Range with the Bespoke refrigerator in 2021 and the uptake has surpassed our expectation especially in the niche market. Our next step is to continue creating more awareness and accelerate sales uptake through strategic partnerships that resonate with lifestyle living.
- What do you expect the uptake of the 2022 range to be? Which Electronic do you think Kenyans will really buy?
In 2021 the uptake for AI enabled washing machines and the QLED TV’s was quite high with the 55 and 65 inch QLED’s being our strategic lineup to showcase Samsung innovation. This year we anticipate the Frame TV and the Bespoke refrigerator will take center stage in showcasing Samsung innovation and differentiation in the Kenyan market. Our customers have high expectation to the Samsung brand and thus look forward to giving them the best in terms of value proposition with Frame TV and Bespoke lineup.
