Week 10

We keep on ideating

Biomimetics

Biomimetics is a technique that consists in trying to replicate the way nature works to solve a problem.

Biomimetics has been used plenty of times in the real world, with one of the most known cases being the inspiration of the kingfisher's beak in the design of bullet trains to reduce costs and sounds.

Using this technique, we found the following interesting behaviours in some animals.

Hippopotamus and Aspen Trees

Hippopotamus do something interesting to protect themselves against the sun: they generate some chemicals that help protect themselves against UV Rays. Whilst the most notable case, they may not be the only ones, as some fish have been found to do some similar things.

It'd be interesting if we could make our product "sweat" a bit of suncreen every now and then, so that the client can apply it to himself and as a reminder that it is time to use it again (after 2 or 3 hours).

Of course, this would only happen whenever the client had the product on its hand.

Aspen Trees work in a similar way as described previously: they can produce a white chalky powder that, if applied on the skin, can work as a natural sunscreen. Albeit, and this is important to mention, the protection is not as high as with sunscreen, the important thing here that can be very useful in our product is the way this works.

Elephants

Another animal that has an interesting way to protect themselves against the sun are elephants. Apart than the fact that they have a thick skin, elephants have realized and learnt that mud works as a natural sunscreen (similarly as the white substance generated by aspen trees), so of course they found a way to apply it to themselves, specially on their backs.

How? They move their trunks. Could this peculiar movement and way of applying sunscreen be useful and/or interesting to some of our clients? It really could be.

More details on our ideas

After discussing with the group, we developed some ideas more in an attempt to find pros and cons of each one. A brief description will be shown up next.

Complimentary app

A complimentary app that could do the following things:

Save some data (like name, age, geographic location, etc.) and give recommendations accordingly.
Notifications every certain time so the user gets reminded to use sunscreen.
Displaying current UV index levels for your area.

And to be confirmed:

Displaying your skin phototype according to the fitzpatrick scale just by using a picture of oneself.
UV ray cam that can show you if you are protected or not with enough sunscreen.

Versatile and portable visor

A visor versatile enough so it can act as other objects, such as a hat or a windbreaker.

It should be very portable, so the user can fold it and store it, and maybe even use it as a keyring. Some kind of cloth could be used for the windbreaker part.

Pros: even if it's uncomfortable to carry, it should be easy to do so, and it has multiple uses.

Cons: it really doesn't solve the laziness issue, it already exists as a basic product, may not be very simple to use, it can be uncomfortable to carry something as big as this.

Dispenser with the right amount of sunscreen

A small bottle or dispenser, so it can be portable, with even a hook or something similar so it can be easily "stuck" to clothing, that outputs the right amount of sunscreen one should use, helping the user control their sunscreen usage correctly.

The dispenser could easily adapt to bottles of many shapes and forms, so the user could just swap bottles very quickly. This brings an array of opportunities, such as creating different collections that can be flashy to our customer.

This dispenser could also be regulable, so the user can get a chance to regulate the dosage.

Pros: portable, can be very useful if it goes with an app that can remind the user when and why to use sunscreen, the designs could be useful to a certain client segment, we could make collections with different bottle designs.

Cons: could be complicated to regulate the exact dosage, might not make a lot of sense without a complimentary app.

Wet towels

A 2 in 1 package including a classical wet towel so the user can clean his or her face and a second one humidifed with sunscreen for an easy and quick use to their face.

The package should be subdivided so both towels don't mix with each other, and the use of a non-woven cloth would be very beneficial, specially for people with sensitive skins.

We didn't agree on a size, but should this product be chosen it is important to mention it could come in variety of sizes.

Pros: easy and practical to use, relatively factible, skin-friendly if used with non-woven cloth, useful for outside-ish contexts (such as a field day or a beach day).

Cons: might not be very popular amongst men, not very portable (depending on size), there is a chance the suncreen could go bad because of the package material, possible waste generation, difficult to measure the right amount of sunscreen per use (per towel), we could get in a legal issue by using a third-party sunscreen (we would need to make an alliance with a current provider).

Container that changes colors when it is time to re-apply sunscreen

A bottle that changes color whenever enough time (between two and three hours) goes by so the user can know it is time to re-apply sunscreen to his/her face and body.

The color is reversible, as in it could go back to its original color after some time. We could use photochromic material for this.

Pros: could be complementary to other products.

Cons: could be hard to implement, doesn't make much sense just by itself.

First iterations of Business Model Canvas and Value Proposition Canvas

Final points

At the end, we decided to mix most of the good points within one idea: a sunscreen dispenser that, as an option to apply it on your face and body, can be used with wet towels.

An initial design made by team member Veronica can be seen below this text.

We also agreed that the app is a must, so we should also present one by the end of the semester.

We will see how things progress the following weeks.

Page updated