GROUP 1
Diyah Babhania, Po-Chun Liu, Eugene Tang, Xiaoni Zhang
Project Task: design an object that either makes a specific task easier or improves the overall quality of life at home
Target Problems: cleaning induction stove after cooking is both energy and time consuming
Target Customers: anyone who cooks and needs to clean their induction stoves
Brief: create a way to maintain the cleanliness from the induction stove
Final design: SABRE
Introduction
Looks-like Prototype (CAD Rendering Model)
Works-like Prototype
Customer needs lie in the centre of our design. Throughout the design phase, we interacted with user groups through surveys and interviews and incorporated their opinions into our final product. With multiple design and prototyping iterations, we created this amazing product SABRE.
It is a handheld, motor-driven, multifunctional single device. The scraper is integrated with a wiper and an inner vacuum cleaner, making SABRE one of a kind, capable of cleaning all types of kitchen stoves with one go.
Research Methods
With the outbreak of Covid-19, the group observed an increasing amount of time spent in kitchens across almost all groups. We therefore want to focus on addressing common issues faced by people in the kitchen.
Initially, research and statistics were gathered online. To have a better insight into the problems faced by people in the kitchen daily, a survey was created, followed by detailed interviews with a few participants. Market research was performed to discover current available products for induction cooker cleaning. Throughout the design phase, feedback were gathered from respondents through interviews.
01
Method: created a Google survey consisted of 10 questions. Questions include cooking skills, average time spent in the kitchen before and after COVID-19, and the type of problems encountered by people in the kitchen.
Result: 49 response were obtained, with the respondent age ranging from 18 to 26, majority of them being University students who are normal kitchen users after the rising of Covid-19 (2.5-hour average spending in kitchen per day).
Key Finding: Cleaning, especially induction stove after cooking, was observed to be a common problem faced by many.
Survey
Many mentioned cleaning countertop and stove as their most annoying kitchen problem
Top 3 categories of problems faced by people: cleaning, sink and countertop
02
Method: market research was conducted online to investigate if similar products are already available. The most important aspect of launching SABRE was ensuring that there was an area of opportunity within the market.
Results: the gap present in the market was crucial in our decision to explore our product further.
Key Finding: Whilst there were detergents and scrapers sold, there were no devices suitable for our target problem.
Market research
There has been a steady increase in the sale of induction cookers in particular.
Another common way of cleaning food burnt on stove is using a scraper; however, this is a very tiring process and requires additional wipe after scrapping.
03
Method: initially, 2 interviews were conducted to gain deeper understanding of the customers’ needs. Throughout the design phase, we presented the development of our product on a two-week basis to receive feedback from 3 respondents (kitchen user with different time spending) through interviews.
Result: Customer feedbacks were used to adjust the focus of our design, and better suit customer needs.
Key Findings: the reasons people find induction cooker cleaning troublesome are because i) food spillage during cooking is an unpreventable problem and ii) cleaning afterwards is a tiring process: even with multiple times of wiping, the burnt food can be hard to come off.
Interview
Meet the two interviewees that we talked with during the initial design phase
We conducted a final interview with three of our potential customers who have witnessed the whole design process of our products. Sabre has received positive feedbacks from these interviewees!
DESIGN PROCESS
Scroll, and follow our journey
Outcome
Sabre will be retailed at £19.99 to departmental stores, as part of cleaning bundles, and as part of kitchenware.
Click on the images below for further design considerations.
Scroll through and understand why our product is the next thing your kitchen needs, and how each element has been designed,
Just For YOU