Whirlpool 2005 Annual Report Download - page 10

Hank Marcy, Vice President, Corporate Innovation
Marise Kumar, Vice President, Customer Loyalty
Whirlpool Corporation
Whirlpool Corporation’s highly successful Duet laundry
pair stirs a passion of ownership within consumers, which
makes them more likely to recommend Whirlpool brand
to their friends. Why? The answer is a vivid snapshot of
how Whirlpool’s strategy to meet consumer needs through
our innovation capability can distinguish us within the
marketplace and create differentiated value.
Vice President of Corporate Innovation Hank
Marcy and Marise Kumar, the company’s Vice President of
Customer Loyalty, are charged with integrating innovation
efforts into our broader company strategy.
“By identifying and measuring the drivers of
customer needs and wants, we focus our innovation efforts
on those product improvements that will ultimately produce
long-term value for shareholders by expanding the breadth
and depth of our customer relationships,” says Marise.
Whirlpool regularly monitors consumer usability habits
and preferences. Over the last few years, the functional
and emotional input of more than 30,000 home appliance
users has been converted into a focus on creating products
that drive loyalty to our brands worldwide.
“With customer satisfaction as our focus, we
made a concerted effort to determine which attributes
of our products and services drive consumers to our
products and have now explicitly focused our innovation
efforts on those touchpoints,” says Hank. “Our customer
focus and innovation processes are now embedded
across the entire corporation versus sitting on the side in
a separate organization.”
The result is a cadence of well-designed products and
services that answer consumer needs, sometimes even before
the consumer is able to articulate them. The Whirlpool fast
fill water and ice dispenser, the innovative pedestals upon
which the Duet laundry pair rest, the KitchenAid steam-assist
oven, Whirlpool Europe’s built-in cooking line, our novel
artistic refrigerators in Latin America, and the Gladiator
Garageworks line of products … are just a few examples of
recent Whirlpool innovations driving the attractiveness of
our brands in the marketplace worldwide.
Customer-Focused Innovation People / Process / Products
Our customer focus and innovation processes are
now embedded across the entire corporation versus sitting
on the side in a separate organization. — Hank Marcy
6 Whirlpool Corporation