Feuerfest

The start: Knockoff browser extension

A few weeks ago I wrote a post about the Knockoff browser extension which helps consumers to filter out cheap and bogus brands from the Amazon search results. Now I found two websites which help me even more in a) filtering out/recognising bad brands and b) find good brands that still produce quality products which are worth their price.

Discovering: Worse on Purpose.com

It all started when I noticed that the WMF Clip&Close ice cube box is similar to the one produced by EMSA. And both had the same worse reviews as the plastic doesn't seem to be made for storing in freezes as it breaks easily and constantly. Naturally I was curious why WMF sells such crappy products.

And I found the solution on a webpage called Worse on Purpose. In the article Your Cookware Got Worse On Purpose author Keyana Sapp writes in detail about how family-owned companies are bought by international conglomerates who just seek to own the established brand name known for it's high quality products, to sell their cheap & crappy stuff.

The solution to this curiosity was rather boring. Under the headline Six companies, eighty-one brands we learn that both companies are owned by Groupe SEB (Wikipedia) who bought WMF & EMSA in 2016 and is, according to Wikipedia, the world's largest manufacturer of cookware.

Great, that will definitely not have any impace on the quality of WMF products rights? Oh wait.. There have been numerous factories closed since 2025...

The Brand Legder

Worse on Purpose operates The Brand Ledge where you can search for brands and companies names to get a small overview and can now decided for yourself if you still trust that brand. Takes this example for WMF: https://ledger.worseonpurpose.com/brands/wmf

Neat! And very handy!

BuyItForLife.com, the Chef'n Juicer & WMF

I don't really know what to make out of buyitforlife.com. It's a website seemingly vetting products the website owner has used/is using himself.

He states and the frontpage:

Browse 500+ Buy It For Life products I've personally vetted for quality and longevity. Compare where they're made, warranty, category, and price in seconds.
Source: https://buyitforlife.com/

And on the about page:

This list isn't sponsored or biased. It's just me, someone who likes well-built products, going down a rabbit hole to find things that are actually built to last.
Source: https://buyitforlife.com/about

Why I am experiencing such an uneasy feeling when reading that site?

Well, I found the site today. I was search for a manually operated lemon/citrus squeezer/press. The WMF one looked nice at first for 38,99€ but luckily the  Chef'n PalmZester (22,79€) was displayed right next to it.. And.. Well look for yourself:

First the Chef'n model in yellow, than the WMF one in black. They are exactly the same model, just different colours. And apparently black is 16€ more expensive.. Yeah, are you kidding me!?

Amazon reviews on both products state, that it breaks after just 1 year of regular usage. As apparently the plastic can't deal with the stress and breaks at some point. Wow.

What is even more interesting: Chef'n is owned by Lifetime Brands Inc.

And that is a totally different company which as nothing to do with Group SEB who owns WMF. This proves, again, that the brand WMF now stands for nothing. Just a shell used to sell cheap products for a higher price.

Good job capitalism!

BuyItForLife however has this product listed on it's site. Among many other products from companies which Worse on Purpose has on it's Watchlist or where people on Reddit say for years that the products became shittier over the time. I think this is my problem with that site. BuyItForLife is just a single person without any special knowledge. Just recommending products he finds useful. That's fair. Nothing against that, but it isn't as objective as it claims to be. It's just a single persons opinion - marketed as something more...

Nowhere on the site can I read a detailed review about a product. All links point directly to Amazon. No "This is why I recommend that item", nothing. For me, personally, this simply doesn't add up. So no, I'm not going to recommend that site.

Everything I ever wanted to know about Mett. Honestly I was just bored when I clicked on that video, thought of it to have a bit of over-promising/misleading title.

But that turned out to be wrong. Oliver Kim or Microbehunter explains in detail why we Germans are able to eat Mett. Which is somewhat of a oddity, given that raw pork can be dangerous and is frowned upon in many cultures and countries.

He explains the bacteria involved and also the system Germany has in place to ensure the meat is healthy. And this was really something new for me. I know that Germany is often praised for it's good infrastructure, however never had I considered uninterrupted cold-chains and strict meat controls to be a part of that. Turns out, Oliver is right, to offer raw pork at any butchery or even bread rolls with Mett as ready-to-eat items in bakeries is quite an achievement.

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=azdV7EzP0v4

Things you do to calm down in the evening. 😄

Now my sauce cooking book is a bit more organised. Making it easier to find what I search.

A microwave can definitely be useful in the kitchen. I don't doubt that. Even if it does nothing more than an oven, it does it faster. However, you can't prepare all dishes with a microwave. For those, you still need an oven. I don't currently own a microwave and gave mine away years ago. I realised that the microwave was causing me to develop unhealthy eating habits. That's why I started cooking. My sister once gave me a wok pan for my birthday. It's by far my favourite kitchen appliance since.

Huh? You don't know what I'm talking about?

Then feel free to read this wonderful analogy written by Colin Cornaby:

In the Future All Food Will Be Cooked in a Microwave, and if You Can’t Deal With That Then You Need to Get Out of the Kitchen

The Mastodon account Die Gerichte im echten Norden ("The courts in the real north") operated by the German federal state of Schleswig-Holstein made 3 posts regarding the legal risks of leaving negative restaurant reviews on Google.

The three toots translated via DeepL:

(1/3) 🧵 Short #servicepost thread, because we keep seeing that people don't realise what the consequences can be when writing #GoogleReviews:

⚠️ ONLY make negative claims publicly if you can prove that your claims are true in a court of law. Because the burden of proof for the accuracy is usually on you as the author!

Source: https://social.schleswig-holstein.de/@gerichteSH/114312989700813905

The topic regarding "burden of proof" should be well-known for many internet users. No matter if it's regarding eBay or Amazon reviews or (former) employer reviews on sites like Kununu or Glassdoor. As for the latter two, there is a reason why many people say: "Read between the lines". As the company's own legal, HR and marketing departments are constantly stalking the site and removing anything that isn't a 5-star review or a very positively worded 4-star review.

Also I know some people who only read 1-star to 4-star reviews on Amazon as they proofed to be reliable and well-balanced.

🧵 (2/3) ⚠️ ONLY make negative claims publicly if it is worth around EUR 5,000 to you if the worst comes to the worst! Because that's how much a lost lawsuit over a Google comment can cost you!!!

Source: https://social.schleswig-holstein.de/@gerichteSH/114312993849784862

Again "If it comes to the worst". This means: You wanting to take it to court or having no option to solve it out of court. As usually you should be able to just deleted the comment, contact the lawyer (maybe pay some legal fees) and be done with it.

🧵 (3/3) 😱 5,000 EUR????

Yes, because such comments often jeopardise the existence of the companies concerned. The courts set the amounts in dispute correspondingly high. Often around EUR 10,000. And the legal fees and court costs are then calculated on the basis of the amounts in dispute. These quickly add up to around EUR 5,000.

The editorial team (mp)

Source: https://social.schleswig-holstein.de/@gerichteSH/114312997451999281

Such comments jeopardise the existence of companies? Wow. Yeah, I heard bad service, low quality food for a comparatively high price, vermin & pests in the kitchen & storage rooms jeopardise the existence too. And many comments should refer to these topics.

*sigh*

The bigger problem: Honest, non-five-star reviews are removed en masse

Unsurprisingly, many companies contest, report or challenge any review that is not five stars on their profile. This is because public review scores on platforms such as Amazon or Google are a key factor for the vast majority of internet users. In fact, there are even law firms that specialise in this area.

This leads to the problem that reviews are becoming increasingly worthless. Ultimately, this renders the entire rating system obsolete. However, most internet users are unaware of these issues. They don't realise that there is an entire industry dedicated to manipulating every aspect of the 'review economy'.

Bad reviews? Report them as false claims. Most reviewers won't take it to court and won't care. In 99.9% of cases, they wouldn't be able to prove it in court anyway.

Reviewer resists? Take a lawyer.

Got too few reviews? Not enough 5-star reviews? Buy them in bulk. Done.

ARD Marktcheck, a German public television format, even recently made a video about this:

What now?

People in the video came to different solutions. One posted his review on his blog where "ARD Markt" found it and now he is prominently featured in this TV piece.

Another woman recommend that it should be made public, by Google, how many reviews have been deleted for that company. Something I strongly second!

And me? I think that making official reports on food inspections public could counteract this problem in the restaurant industry, as they verify legal obligations and requirements and are therefore far more relevant. Yes, this still doesn't solve the problem of these inspections happening too infrequently, but it's an improvement on the current situation.

The current situation only benefits those who provide poor service

This just goes to show how bad the situation is in the restaurant, hotel and catering industry. Some cities make their mandatory restaurant inspection reports public, while others don't. This is due to problematic laws which could make the city liable for any potential damages caused. The DEHOGA (Deutscher Hotel- und Gaststättenverband, in english: German Hotel and Restaurant Association), has even publicly attacked the non-profit platform "Topf Secret" from FoodWatch & FragDenStaat.

Topf Secret enables citizens to utilise the German Verbraucherinformationsgesetz (VIG) – the consumer information law – to request reports on health and food safety checks. The results are then published on the platform, making them publicly available to all. The name is a German pun: "Topf" means pot or kettle, and "Topf secret" refers to the phrase "top secret" and the fact that the reports are not actually publicly available.

DEHOGA states that the law sets out which reports must be made public and which must not be. For example, violations must at least result in a minimum fine of €350, and reports must be deleted after six months. Likewise, reports due to construction or documentation deficits are not to be published either.

I understand their point. It's the same in every specialised field. How can information collected and edited by professionals be understood by non-experts? Are problems exaggerated? Are findings that are not at all problematic in terms of food safety presented as such? These are valid concerns, in my opinion.

Companies also need to be protected against abusive reviews. Review platform operators such as Google and Amazon must also fulfil their legal obligations. I'm not arguing against that.

However, there is one major issue that nobody has addressed so far.

I can understand, and would expect, that the DEHOGA protects all its members and lobbies for favourable legislation. On the other hand, there is also a valid concern from citizens about food safety and hygiene in restaurants. In all the TV documentations I have seen about food safety controllers doing their job, I have always heard them say: "I don't eat in restaurants any more. I've seen too much." There are problems.

We are now left with a situation where customers want to be informed, but the respective industry association doesn't want this information to be published. They cite problems with some laws and general problems when information requiring a certain amount of expertise to understand is published.

Hmm...

Hmmmmm...

Let's think about that for a minute.

Who got that expertise? The DEHOGA.

Who could run such a platform for all their members? The DEHOGA.

Who could ensure laws are followed precisely? The DEHOGA.

Who says it's there to ensure a high standard in gastronomy? The DEHOGA.

Who acts in the interests of all their members? The DEHOGA.

Doesn't publicly outing the bad ones automatically reward the good ones? Those who do a good job, that is. Yes, it does.

Why doesn't DEHOGA run this platform? That's a very good question. In fact, they could even cooperate with FoodWatch and FragDenStaat. Thus eliminating any doubts that a form of greenwashing is being practised here.

The current system only really serves the bad ones. Those with subpar service, prices, food quality, or even severe hygiene or safety issues.

But let's face the truth: the DEHOGA is an industry association. Its purpose is to maximise its members' revenue by lobbying for favourable legislation, and so on. It's not there to ensure customers get good service. I wonder if "good service" and "maximising revenue" are connected in any way. Hmm... But I forgot that, for most people, capitalism just means "getting rich quickly with as little work as possible".

And now restaurant owners are wondering why I visit them so rarely.

Photo by Pixabay: https://www.pexels.com/photo/green-broccoli-vegetable-on-brown-wooden-table-47347/

Recently cooked this and really like it. Grating the broccoli was a bit cumbersome, but it was worth it.

If you prefer to watch it directly on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aWjyCXevoyc