brown goods

English

Etymology

From their colour. Consumer electronics equipment formerly had a brown wooden veneer.

Noun

brown goods pl (plural only)

1. consumer electronics equipment for entertainment, such as televisions and music centres
   • 1999, Miles, Ian, "Home Informatics: New Consumer Technologies, in eds. William H. Dutton et al., Society on the Line: Information Politics in the Digital Age, page 107

     Electronics capabilities led to the emergence of a distinction between "white goods" (the typically enamelled kitchen appliances such as fridges and cookers) and "brown goods" (such as wood- or bakelite-cased record players, radios, and TVs).

2. unbleached cotton textiles
3. (beverage industry) spirits which are brown in colour, such as whiskey
   • 2012, Dwight B. Heath, “To every thing there is a season: When do people drink?”, in Drinking Occasions: Comparative Perspectives on Alcohol and Culture‎^[1], Routledge, →ISBN, page 35:

     In the U.S., there has been a gradual shift from “brown goods” (darker colored drinks, such as whiskey and brandy) to “white goods” (lighter colored drinks, such as gin and vodka).

Coordinate terms

• red goods
• white goods
• yellow goods

Translations

consumer electronics

• Swedish: hemelektronik (sv) c, brunvaror pl
• Welsh: nwyddau brown m pl