The Electric Bulb as a Product in Nigeria

PRODUCT UNDER REVIEW: The electric bulb, tube, spiral, spring or whatever it looks like.

SITUATION REPORT: The electric bulb is one of the consumer intensive products unrepentantly exploited by the fake product kingdom in Nigeria. Once upon a time when my father was a very young man and I was a very young boy, electric bulbs lasted more than a year on the ceiling, and they were so strong one could fall from the ceiling to the floor and did not break. Today, the bulbs we have around are so fragile you could accidentally break one like an egg if you don’t hold it like an egg, and they go pop the minute you put them in the lamp holder and switch on the light, then you need to go buy another one.

I think, many Nigerians think, that some importer in Nigeria has connived with some manufacturer somewhere to deliberately make and dump fake products in Nigeria in order to increase the product failure rate and, therefore, the frequency of customer purchase, translating to more money for the partners in business crime. The electric bulb is one of those products. The longest time one of these light bearers lasts in Nigeria is two weeks before it dies.

You, Nigerian, please tell me I am wrong. Give me and all Nigerians your advice. Which brand of bulb, in your true experience, do you recommend for better value for money? I have personally bought an “original” one in one of the biggest and most expensive supermarkets. Ask me how long it lasted? I’ll tell you how long it lasted. One week! That’s how long it lasted, one week! Came back from work one day and switched on the light, the light came and said hello and goodbye at the same time. I thought it was a problem with the switch, so I started flicking the thing on and off and on and off, but no way, the bulb was really dead, muerto, caput, finito.

And it was really expensive. Instead of 50 Naira a bulb at the shop in my street, I played the big man and bought it at the big supermarket, for how much? 400 Naira, thinking it was going to last a long, long time, like it did around the time when Cassius Clay beat the daylight out of Sonny Liston, but it didn’t. I wasted the money of eight freaking bulbs, sorry, on one, and I won’t try it again, unless I travel to some place like Europe and buy some quality brand, because, really, these products we find in Nigeria, there’s no way they can find their way into a place like Europe. They will be destroyed by the Customs right there at the Sea Port before they are cleared, and the importer will be arrested.

But in Nigeria, we repeatedly buy the same fake products because, in most cases, the common man has no alternative, even though the Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON) are doing their best to not let fake products come into the country. But I beg the Nigerian Government, please put more grease on SON’s elbow so they can more effectively make importers import only “original” and genuine products into Nigeria, so that we can buy products that will last a good length of time before it is time for a replacement. As it is today, replacement is just too frequent.

RECOMMENDATIONS: Well, Nigeria Product Review is going to town and we are doing the research. We are interviewing the importers and the sellers and buyers and quality control authorities and you will like to know what they are telling us, next.

PRICES: Check out the current types and prices of bulbs in Nigeria here.

VIDEO: OK! Nigeria Product Review went to town alright, we are back and we have the video to prove it. Click below, see what the experts are saying so that you know how to buy your bulbs from now on.

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