When you have a product called Sumo Slicer, it would come as no surprise it is going to do well in a country like Japan.
The super-efficient hand powered rotary grater is Kleva Range’s largest kitchen appliance export and Japan has become its biggest market, especially during the pandemic. In fact, the company has had to bring on board more staff to cope with the huge spike in demand.
“Japan has quickly become one of our largest exports and the Sumo Slicer is the driving force behind this trend,” says Kleva Range founder and CEO, James Cheney.
“The Sumo Slicer lends its hands perfectly to Japanese cuisine with accurate and fine slicing and dicing for gyozas, sushi and ramen, to name a few popular dishes.
“Sumo is synonymous with big, powerful and amazing in Japan, which inspired the name of the Sumo Slicer due to its ability to powerfully produce large family-sized dishes at a super-charged speed. We launched the Sumo Slicer in 2018 and it has quickly become one of our best-selling and most loved Kleva Range products.”
The three interchangeable stainless steel drums in the Sumo Slicer make it fast and efficient―in fact, 18 times faster than slicing by hand. This device is a coarse shredder, super slicer and a fine grater all in one, making it the ultimate tool for creating delicious dishes or desserts, says Cheney.
“For anyone who’s knife skills aren’t quite up to scratch or who doesn’t like working with sharp knives, the Sumo Slicer will perform slicing, grating and cutting up to professional standards. With minimum effort and clean up, the Sumo Slicer adds a magical touch to any recipe.
“One of the top reviews we hear coming out of Japan is how it has completely freed up their bench space, which often is quite limited in their compact inner-city kitchens. The Sumo Slicer replaces the need for bulky and heavy blenders, food processors and blenders that dramatically reduce cooking space, and often do not produce the desired results home cooks are after.”
The Aussie homewares business sells more than 300 household innovations and gadgets online including the Diamond Earth 7 piece cookware set, Kleva Cut Master series knife range, Remedial massage gun and its Power Pedi collapsible foot spa.
“Everything we do is with the customer and end-user in mind. We constantly think about the product’s functionality before, during and after use. It is important to not only focus on how the product works but also how can the customer store it, how can it be cleaned and what maintenance does it need? These are all very important questions that we address during the product development process.
“One of the hardest things in our business is selecting the colours of products… and we can confidently say we don’t always get it right the first time. Generally with our product launches we test smaller amounts of the new products and see what the customer preference is and adjust the colour options if we need to.
“Everyday innovations for us is about listening to our customer, when developing and growing our product range we are tirelessly working with a plethora of designers and manufacturers to provide quality solutions that really work. For 2021 we are very excited about our new range of kitchen appliances, gardening solutions and everyday innovations,” adds Cheney.
