Can openers baffle me - not the purpose they serve but how many shoddy ones are on the market! Ones that are stiff, ones where the point doesn't pierce the can, the ones that fall apart after two uses. Especially in my house, where I have no patience and no hand wrist strength, and my grandparents are older and find conventional can openers a struggle, especially when their arthritis is playing up, and as I am not around most of the day at work - I did some research into electric can openers and bought the Kenwood Electric can opener. I believe I paid about £11.00 from Amazon.

The opener is very simple to operate, once you plug it in all you do is lift the handle, put the can in place and pull the handle back down. The blade cuts underneath the top of the rim of the can, so there is no serrated / jagged edge to catch your fingers on, cutting smoothly and cleanly. Handily there is a magnet on the device that secures the lid / part of the can that has been cut off, in place once you have used the appliance, meaning you don't have to try and fish the lid out afterwards (one of my pet hates!) Whilst operating the can opener it does make quite a significant amount of noise, especially in comparison to a manual operation opener. However I think the performance of the appliance compensates for 10 seconds of noise.

The opener is easy to clean - I give the blade a wipe after each use. The blade does appear to be removable for ease of cleaning, however it doesn't seem to get much debris on it to the point that I have needed to remove the blade.

Something to take into consideration is that there is no on / off switch on the appliance, so if it is plugged in, there is off button to override the power on the device - something to think about if you have young curious children who clamber on the worktops. This isn't so much of an issue for my household but I felt it was worth mentioning.

I would highly recommend this can opener, especially to

* Elderly People
* People with joint issues / arthritis
* Those fed up of forking out for abysmal manual can openers.