Why On Earth Would Anyone Need A $1,000 Vacuum Cleaner?

There are perfectly good vacuum cleaners that cost downwards of $100. Then there is the Dyson V8 cord-free vacuum. It’s the Ferrari of vacuum cleaners. It makes dull-as-dust household appliances sexy. In fact, think of it as the masculine, revved-up version of Plumette, the sexy feather duster in Beauty and the Beast. It’s the kind of machine that makes spoilt millennials that wouldn’t touch dust with a 10-foot pole, um, want to touch dust with a sleek, shiny 2.5-foot orange pole. But why is it so expensive? We can think of a few reasons.

40 minutes of non-stop dust-busting action: The V8 is a cord-free wonder that will change the way you clean.

#2: It’s cord-free. So cut loose, and vacuum up a storm.
Oh, the places you’ll go — when you’re not tethered to a power point. At a press launch for the V8, journalists vacuumed up cereal, confetti and talcum powder with wild abandon, from the floor, the tops of shelves and off the bed. The V8 will happily go where electrical sockets cannot — your car, outdoors, the furthest corners of the earth… just make sure you don’t need to vacuum for more than 40 minutes. That’s the runtime of the battery on a full charge. It doesn’t seem very long, but when you’re cord-free, you can bust dust a lot faster. Previous generation Dyson vacuums could only run for 20 minutes.

Powerful sucker: The Dyson V8 can be used in a plethora of ways — attach the orange wand for reach and maneuverability, and switch among a few different heads for different surfaces and purposes.

#3: It promises to make your living environment healthier and free of allergens.
The folks at Dyson take their dust-busting pretty seriously. They’re apparently the only home appliance manufacturer with its own in-house microbiology lab, where they study microscopic organisms and particles, including the pesky dust mite, which can cause allergic reactions such as sneezing, nasal congestion and watery eyes. The Dyson V8 captures allergens and expels cleaner air with whole-machine HEPA filtration, and sucks up dust and other nasties (including the 28g of skin flakes humans shed every month, ew) from your mattress, sofa and everywhere in between.

#4: It’s a powerful sucker. But it’s quiet.
Having tried the V8, we can tell you it spares nothing. A Dyson rep emptied like half a bottle of talcum powder onto a mattress and urged us to clean up. The V8 sucked it up like a dream, even from under the bed sheets. Large particles like cereal and pet hair are no problem, and if you ever emptied a bottle of glitter onto the carpet, let’s just say you won’t have to buy a new carpet. And for all its power, the V8 is pretty quiet — 50 per cent quieter than previous generation machines.

Dust, dust, go away: Households with kids will benefit from the V8's dust and allergen-busting abilities.