The Home and Housewares Show: A Brief Quirky History
The International Home and Housewares Show, hosted at Chicago’s McCormick Place, is the largest housewares-only show in the world. The show attracts 2,200 vendors featuring their incredible products and more than 60,000 attendees looking for what’s new in the world of housewares.
Kitchen was a huge focus of this year’s show. Natural-themed products and fun-infused ideas were also a big hit. Large companies the likes of Whirlpool/KitchenAid, Cuisinart, Thermos, Midea, Eureka featured their latest and greatest products. There were also many inventors featuring their own ideas – which we loved!
Quirky showcased more than 20 of its products invented by real people like you, including its power line with crowd favorites Pivot Power, Switchflip, Prop Power and Port Power. Quirky kitchen products Ventu, Bake Shapes and Tether made an appearance and new storage solutions Slimline, Cubby and Versa Store were introduced.
Over the 80+ years the Home and Housewares Show has been around, many interesting inventions where showcased to the world. Below are some of our favorites.
- 1906 – The first Housewares show was held in the NYC Madison Square Garden
- 1910 — Chester Beach’s small motor powered a milkshake mixer for a Wisconsin dairy company. He partnered with L. H. Hamilton to form the Hamilton Beach Company.
- 1915 — Corning Glass Works developed a glass to withstand extreme temperatures for railroad signal lanterns—this led to PYREXovenproof cookware.
- 1928 — Manufacturer Col. Jacob Schick patented a men’s electric shaver. The electric shaver market reached its first year of million-unit sales in 1936.
- 1938 — KitchenAid introduced a stand mixer designed by Egmont Arens. The stand mixer became the company’s keystone product and its form a symbol for a product type.
- 1948 — Engineer/entrepreneur Lewis Salton invented an electrically heated tray to keep food warm at the dining table. His HoTray served buffet-style parties for decades.
- 1958 — Corning introduced Pyroceram, a ceramic-glass material that could endure heat and cold and was strong enough for space missile nose cones. Corning Ware cookware soon became a kitchen classic.
- 1966 — In Germany, Heinz Hankammer developed the AquaDeMat filter to desalinate water to use in car batteries. He made jug water filters for home tap water and named his new company, Brita, after his daughter.
- 1979 — Black & Decker applied the technology it created for the Apollo moon landing to its Dustbuster.
- 1994 — Salton, Inc. invited boxer George Foreman to represent its new grill, the George Foreman Lean Mean Fat-Reducing Grilling Machine.
- 1999 — Procter & Gamble’s Swiffer made its debut. The mop with the dirt-grabbing, disposable cloths created a new category of cleaning tools.
- 2002 — The iRobot Corp., founded by Helen Greiner and partners to create military, industrial, and research robots, introduced the Roomba vacuuming robot and in 2005, the Scooba floorwashing robot.
Source: Wikipedia
Learn more about Quirky Products featured at the Home and Housewares Show (#IHHS2018):
- Pivot Power – Jake Zien
- Switchflip – Inventor Erin Wiggins
- Prop Power – Inventor Jacob Riesgaard
- Port Power – Inventor Marc Zech
- Carabandits – Inventor Marc Zech
- Slimline – Inventor Leanne Luce
- Crates – Inventor Jenny Drinkard
- Cubbycomb – Inventor Lisah
- Cubby – Inventor Tammy Maddrey
- Versa Store – Inventor Robert Francois
- Stackable Locker Storage – Inventor Jaswinder Brar
- Pawcet – Inventor Tony Lytle
- Silo – Inventor Jan H
- Broom Groomer – Inventor Bill Ward
- Squeak – Inventor Team Lab
- Zen Cosmetics – Inventor Edwin Van de Bospoort
- Ventu – Inventor Andrea Z.
- Bake Shapes – Inventor Hadar Ferris
- Tether – Inventor Gary Rose
- Poppit – Inventor Yolanda Jackson
- Stem – Inventor Timothy Houle
- Verseur – Inventor Angelo Cacchione
- Sheath – Inventor Sonia C.G.
- Bobble Brush – Inventor Spencer Sloan
- Solo – Inventor Don Darnell
