Honestly, whirlpool didn’t completely destroy the brand. If whirlpool didn’t acquire Maytag, the brand just outright wouldn’t be around anymore.
And the latest real Maytag stuff was awful. The top loading Neptunes were the worst ones. They had so many control board issues and the transmissions often failed. Horribly designed machines.
If Maytag was still Maytag they’d likely push neptune TLs further. I doubt Maytag would use a VMW design they’d probably use the Neptune TL design for their high efficiency washers. While that’d be interesting, that would give Maytag a worse reputation.
Maytag also had the Amanatags, Atlantis’s, and the Performas, those washers were pretty bad too, premature bearing issues were common, as well as pump issues, and transmission failures.
Even if Maytag was still Maytag, they’d probably just push Neptune TLs all the way which were much worse than the VMWs, or they’d be bought by something else (like Midea or GE).
If GE bought Maytag instead it’d be a disaster because we’d literally have model Ts and HydroWaves under the Maytag brand and since those were so unreliable machines, it would give Maytag a worse rep than it does with Whirlpool buying them.
If you want a Maytag Maytag, pre-2000 is the best way to go as most of the pre-2000 models were dependable care, if you get 2000-2006 you can, but gotta watch out for the Amanatags and magic chef type Maytags since those weren’t that good machines, a lot of those Maytags now just get scrapped and don’t get fixed anymore, similar to the GE Model-Ts and HydroWaves.
As for plastic tubs, I don’t hate plastic tubs in fact they seem to be one of the most reliable designs of tubs, in fact, GE’s plastic tubs rarely broke, sure, they break if you put a brick in it, but washers are not designed to spin with bricks. They didn’t rust and they were durable plastic. The tubs used on the Maytag performas and Amanatags also worked well.
The porcelain tubs seem to be the most prone to issues. Stainless is obviously the best one tho.
Maytag should’ve focused on the dependable care system if they didn’t want to be bought out, not the Neptune or the dependable care replacement, if they didn’t, they may be still around. They should’ve never thought about the Neptune top load washer. Maytag knew what they are doing too.
Also, not all Whirlpool-built Maytags are VMWs/VMAXs, there are also direct drives branded under Maytag, and those machines were just as good as the Whirlpool and Kenmore branded ones, and they used the same wash action. They made them with porcelain and stainless tubs.
The brand faced financial challenges because Maytag has significantly cheapened out their products. If Whirlpool didn’t acquire them, Maytag would probably now be out of business.
And if Maytag stayed independent, brands like Amana would also be affected as those were Maytag brands. They also should’ve made dependable cares for Amana (which Maytag bought out in 2001).
So the reason why Maytag declined is NOT Whirlpool’s fault, in fact, they improved the quality significantly over Maytag’s latest stuff. The pre-2000 Maytag washers, were awesome and I can’t say those were bad.