How did I miss Energizer buying out Rayovac?

[Lynx_Arc]

I was bumbling around and found out that Energizer bought Rayovac for about 2 Billion Dollars in 2019. Although I don't use a lot of alkaleaks I find it sort of disconcerting because overall of the 3 major brands Rayovac typically was the cheapest. Now that it seems there are only 2 Major battery brands in the US will competition be less and prices higher? I do realize more and more generic brands available in stores but I guess I was hoping one day Energizer would have their lithium primary patent expire and Rayovac would produce them at a lower cost.

I'm thinking that Rayovac products will slowly change over time or maybe Energizer will make them into a discount brand like Eveready Gold batteries etc.

 

[idleprocess]

Now that it seems there are only 2 Major battery brands in the US will competition be less and prices higher?

Alkaline cells are a shrinking market. NiMH took a nibble but never really hit as hard as USB everything. Rayovac might live on as a budget marquee and prices might go up, but the ability of alkaline producers to practically extract rent from the market seems to have been broken some 20 years ago.

 

[Hooked on Fenix]

I gave up on alkaleeks after too many leaked in the package long before the expiration date before even getting a chance to put them in a device. I bought a good amount of the 20 packs of Energizer Lithium Primaries when they were clearing out at $10-15 a pack at Costco. Still have some 2100 charge Eneloops still working. Then I have lithium ion 18650s and 21700s. I wish I could trust alkalines, but I've never met a brand that didn't blow. Everything is transitioning to usb rechargeable li-ion for convenience and the green agenda is pushing us away from disposable items to help the environment. There's no future for alkaline batteries and the product turned people away by ruining their devices.

 

[Lynx_Arc]

Alkaline cells are a shrinking market. NiMH took a nibble but never really hit as hard as USB everything. Rayovac might live on as a budget marquee and prices might go up, but the ability of alkaline producers to practically extract rent from the market seems to have been broken some 20 years ago.

The battery makers have gotten fat off alkaleaks pushing them like a drug and hamstringing nimh tech when they could have embraced it honestly they really never appreciated it or spent any substantial effort to advertise and educating its virtues. Battery companies could have been encouraging companies selling devices to make them nimh friendly and include nimh with them and manufacture good chargers also but we never saw that. Battery makers could have lead the charge to lithium ion based devices but they were almost the last ones to get on board and still aren't really enthusiastic about it mainly resorting to it in place of larger battery sizes like C/D cells which are already following the lantern batteries.
Lithium ion is the leader now... but for how long.

 

[Lynx_Arc]

I gave up on alkaleeks after too many leaked in the package long before the expiration date before even getting a chance to put them in a device. I bought a good amount of the 20 packs of Energizer Lithium Primaries when they were clearing out at $10-15 a pack at Costco. Still have some 2100 charge Eneloops still working. Then I have lithium ion 18650s and 21700s. I wish I could trust alkalines, but I've never met a brand that didn't blow. Everything is transitioning to usb rechargeable li-ion for convenience and the green agenda is pushing us away from disposable items to help the environment. There's no future for alkaline batteries and the product turned people away by ruining their devices.

I am still hoping that they put them on sale at Sam's club again as I still need them in devices like outdoor sensors for thermometers. I thought of an idea of using 2032 coin cells for remotes but it would require a 3D printer. The advantages of coin cells is they rarely leak as they are lithium. Most remotes could run a long time using 1-2 coin cells and you can source them cheaply online a lot cheaper than Energizer L91/L92 cells.

 

[bykfixer]

The battery makers have gotten fat off alkaleaks pushing them like a drug and hamstringing nimh tech when they could have embraced it honestly they really never appreciated it or spent any substantial effort to advertise and educating its virtues. Battery companies could have been encouraging companies selling devices to make them nimh friendly and include nimh with them and manufacture good chargers also but we never saw that. Battery makers could have lead the charge to lithium ion based devices but they were almost the last ones to get on board and still aren't really enthusiastic about it mainly resorting to it in place of larger battery sizes like C/D cells which are already following the lantern batteries.
Lithium ion is the leader now... but for how long.

To me that's like saying McDonalds should promote Jenny Craig diet plans so their customers won't eat at McDonalds as often or Exxon should promote Tesla cars so that customers won't buy as much gasoline. Ford motor company promoting everybody ride Schwinn bicycles. BiC lighters promoting the reusable Zippo.

Now I can see a flashlight company or a RC car maker, yeah but the "disposable" battery manufacturers stay in business by selling……disposable batteries.

 

[Lynx_Arc]

To me that's like saying McDonalds should promote Jenny Craig diet plans so their customers won't eat at McDonalds as often or Exxon should promote Tesla cars so that customers won't buy as much gasoline. Ford motor company promoting everybody ride Schwinn bicycles. BiC lighters promoting the reusable Zippo.

There are companies that went under that their name was bought out and now make stuff they never did before.

 

[bykfixer]

Agreed

 

[jtr1962]

There's no future for alkaline batteries and the product turned people away by ruining their devices.

Yep. I never liked alkalines, even when most of them didn't leak, because a stready diet of throw-away batteries is bad for your budget, and even worse for the environment. So color me happy that alkaline battery manufacturers shot themselves in the foot by cutting costs, resulting in leaky cells which turn people off.

Lithium ion is the leader now... but for how long.

My money is on sodium-ion. There are so many negatives to lithium batteries. The mines are environmental disasters. Other than LiFEPO4 they're prone to "rapid disassembly". They have rather finicky charging requirements, although I think sodium-ion still might. Their only saving grace is their energy density.

Now I can see a flashlight company or a RC car maker, yeah but the "disposable" battery manufacturers stay in business by selling……disposable batteries.

Correct but companies diversify. Look at how some of the big oil companies are getting into clean energy. That said, alkaleaks are such a repugnant product on so many levels they should have been regulated out of existence a few years after LSD NiMH came along. The battery manufacturers would have focused on that technology instead.

 

[ledbetter]

There goes my theory that rayovac was less likely to leak than energizer or duracell, well definitely better than DuraLeaks. Somebody on this forum said they had good luck with Panasonic zinc so I might try those for the few times I do use/need alkaline chemistry batteries.

 

[Hooked on Fenix]

Seems to me that alkalines really started leaking a lot after they were made to be mercury free. I don't know if manufacturers cared more about them leaking back then since they would have introduced toxic waste into the environment and gave them better seals, but whatever the case, they really started to self destruct after that. About the only reason to have them now is to stockpile them in case of an emergency or long term grid down scenario, which they'd be useless for because they leak.

 

[Lynx_Arc]

There goes my theory that rayovac was less likely to leak than energizer or duracell, well definitely better than DuraLeaks. Somebody on this forum said they had good luck with Panasonic zinc so I might try those for the few times I do use/need alkaline chemistry batteries.

I've found over the decades that ALL brands leak, I've not truly found any reason for what batteries do and don't leak as I've seen where All brands change their label/design of their batteries and they don't leak any less than the old design.
I do think that a part of increasingly leaking may be related to thickness of the battery container that is a foil/paper shell vs a steel type shell the steel seems to leak less but they still leak too much to be considered over the ones that leak more. I've found that the dollar store (now 1.25 store?) batteries leak about the same but do cost less but have no warranty on them when they do leak.

In the end my major concern is Rayovac over the years tends to be lower priced than Energizer and Duracell and now it is owned by Energizer in time will we see the Rayovac brand vanish entirely and its differing offerings of lights and lanterns also vanish and less lights that we have liked..... gone like the roughneck line etc. I think it has been about 2-3 years now that Rayovac has been absorbed and I'm not sure but I noticed there aren't many or even any rayovac light offerings in stores now if someone can correct me on that observation please do so as it is concerning that instead of gaining more from the buyout are we are essentially losing everything Rayovac is about. One could say did the Energizer borgs assimilate rayovac and now their unique product are no longer?

I've gone through liking all major brands over my lifetime from the old 9 lives cat batteries etc to almost every locally available brand offering in alkaleak and perhaps 1/3 to 1/2 of the heavy duty/carbon type batteries and to be honest none of them really stood out more than others enough to have me loyal to any of them.

I'm not sure but Dorcy is associated with Rayovac but it could be that they were bought out also not that most dorcy products aren't really thrilling to most folks these days. Even their plastic LED flashlights just seem way overpriced and underperforming as Dorcy simply held on to old 5mm tech and then 8/10mm tech to the point of which nobody cared about them any more. I do know that many dorcy products were relabeled and sold under Rayovac and Diehard labels in the past. As I don't see diehard offerings around much they did make batteries also.

 

[WC8KCY]

It wasn't long after the merger that Eveready NiMH AA cells turned up around here with the same 1350 mAh rating as the most common Rayovac NiMH AAs. I would be very surprised if they weren't the same cells.

Somebody on this forum said they had good luck with Panasonic zinc so I might try those for the few times I do use/need alkaline chemistry batteries.

I'm testing a selection of carbon-zinc AA cells (E-Circuit, Eveready, Panasonic, PKCell, and Rayovac) and will be posting a report soon.

I've completed the 100 mA discharge tests and here's how they stacked up:

Rayovac: 777 mAh
Panasonic Super Heavy Duty: 759 mAh
PKCell Extra Heavy Duty: 718 mAh
Eveready Super Heavy Duty: 678 mAh
E-Circuit Super Heavy Duty: 669 mAh

It'll be interesting to see how these cells fare under a 300 mA load, more typical of flashlight use.