Sean, I 100% believe you. In fact I've always thought the same and still do. My honest conjecture is that Maytag was weakened and bought out from within. By acquiring various brands it would serve the purpose of watering down the Maytag name, creating debt, driving away customers, and ultimately eliminating competition from start to finish. Once the covert part was over all Whirlpool had to do was rid Maytag's physical assets and just slap their name on a few Whirlpool products. Me betting that Whirlpool since the mid 80s already knew the most intimate parts of Maytag's assets, intellect, operations, outlook, goals and future plans. Such that from the time of initiating action to the time Whirlpool bought Maytag they had already known, planned and rehearsed on how to proceed going forward.
Conquered and exterminated at the same time. A very cunning, thorough sort of evil.
This is why I have such a strong dislike for Whirlpool as a whole. I don't believe Whirlpool success just rests in their 3 consumer products each having a major point of excel, I think it also rests in Whirlpools ability to monopolize and control the industry from within. I don't believe Whirlpools scope was by chance or customer appeal rather a long standing zeal in conquest.
I make a somewhat similar analogy to McDonald's. They became as large as they did not by selling the tastiest or highest quality food in the world but by appealing to mass culture, to patriotism and deep seated insecurities. McDonald's aggressively advertised itself as being "all American" appealing to US culture and its ideals. Offering apple pie, commercials appealing to US ideals, commercials where the new kid is welcomed into the community by a gathering at their restaurants, appealing to convenience, to workers, coming across as a community friend, ect. For the kids they enticed them with free toys, characters, free entertainment and a safe place they could play. McDonalds was embraced, becoming a trusted member of the community. Name and reputation lead to blind trust and blind appeal for their food. Despite the fact their food was anything but what was advertised.
Perhaps not a perfect analogy, but once name, broad presence and a veneer is established people begin to trust as they themselves deep down are unsure, apprehensive of strangers. Trust has people buying and believing, even if the name is not as stellar as promised.
If everyone was like me the DC and two belt Raytheon would have dominated the market and Whirlpool would have constantly been embroiled in legal action wondering where they kept going wrong. People would have been tilting washers on the sales floor and any time a plastic outer tub, plastic pulley, ect was visible people would have exclaimed "uh, yahh, no. Nope. Not happening" The look on Sears sales people if everyone was like "no, I will purchase a Maytag A9600" or "LAT8005AAE" Along with calls into Maytag about how their washers could have been made better. The world would be a very different place.