Our toaster of maybe a year was one I never liked much, and in the last couple of months it decided to make its own decision on how dark to make the toast on any given day. So, I did some searching at Amazon, finally settling on this bright red model just because, well, it's pretty cool-looking (and had good reviews). It's the largest (and most expensive) toaster we've ever had, but if today is any example, boy does it ever work well!