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Builders of better mousetraps- They tinker, they refine and sometimes it pays off
An article by Lucinda Hahn, Chicago Tribune, May 2, 2006

Ah, those wacky basement inventors. They've burst upstairs and into our consciousness, thanks to the reality TV series "American Inventor."
In fact, the show's brand of Average-Joe tinkerers has been among us since the dawn of humanity -- at least since homo erectus first fashioned an ax out of a hunk of flint.

"I think there's an inventor in absolutely everyone," says Paul Hatch, who has worked with hundreds of inventors as president of the Chicago branch of TEAMS Design, a firm that turns ideas and prototypes into manufacturable products. "But most people will dismiss their idea within a minute, or a week."



Industrial Design and Human Factors: Design
Style, ergonomics, and solid engineering must be forged together when designing power tools
-an article by Richard Babyak, Appliance Design

"Power tools must perform tough tasks; designing them is a tough task, too. There aren't many products where bad design can actually hurt the user, so good power tool design is more than just a desirable option, it's an absolute necessity (Richard)...
..."The consumer power tool market is much more open to new ideas, innovations, trendy styling and colors, much like the consumer electronics market, where it's all about having the latest new thing," says Paul Hatch, president of TEAMS Design, Chicago. TEAMS Design, which also has two offices in Germany, has been designing professional power tools for Bosch for decades. When Bosch bought the Skil line of consumer power tools from Emerson, TEAMS became involved on that side of the business, as well. "The professional market is much more skeptical of what you're trying to sell them," Hatch says.

"Professionals don't want in-your-face styling. The aesthetics require a certain understatement. And professionals don't want gimmicks, either. For example, we came up with an idea for a magnetic plate to go on top of a drill-driver to hold screws and bits, because we'd observed people sticking these things in their mouths as they climbed ladders and so forth. It was a useful idea, but the professionals found it too patronizing and gimmicky. The idea eventually ended up on a Skil cordless drill, though. So it was a useful consumer idea, but not for professionals." In a nutshell, the designers have learned that, while the consumer will buy revolution, the professional prefers evolution.

...In this field, a product can live or die by its handle. It has to provide a good grip and a good fit, but, not too good. TEAMS Design’s Hatch notes that features such as finger grooves that allow the hand to perfectly fit a handle may seem like a good idea at first glance, but can turn out to be a mistake if they dictate how a tool should be held.

“We’ve noticed that, when people start using a tool with one grip, within 30 seconds, they will slightly change the position of their hands or fingers,” Hatch says. “They do it instinctively to avoid cramping. So the danger of finger ridges is that they can be too confining, prohibiting hand shifting, and possibly causing cramping. Another reason is that people need to grip a handle differently for different angles and positions. You need to preserve that flexibility.”

......read the rest of the article on  Appliance Design's website

How to Avert the Asian Shift
(article by Paul Hatch in Innovation magazine)

To combat Asian competitors offering products at a cheaper price, many US manufacturers are reducing their production costs and profit margin ever further. Some manufacturers find that just to keep their head above water they have to outsource their parts abroad. As prices sink lower and lower, only a few can compete on price alone.

The two ways manufacturers can prevent fighting the futile price battle are:
· Innovation. Careful use of original ideas and features enables companies to create their own market outside the battlefield and set the price according to what consumers are willing to pay, rather than to what competitors dictate.
· Brandwide product design. A product that reflects the brand as a whole gives consumers a subconscious understanding of the brand identity through their long-term interaction with the physical product. Thus, the brand language needs to be recognizable in the products themselves, not just the graphics. If the brand language is extended throughout a product line, the user's relationship with one product leads to familiarity of other products within the brand, and thus to brand loyalty.

The problems that manufacturers have been facing over the last five years will soon be coming to the industrial design profession. It is imperative that we shift focus and bring industrial design to a higher level. The two solutions discussed above are our best ammunition. There is a stronger tradition of innovation in Western culture; innovation should be used to our advantage.
Designing with a brandwide perspective is another essential weapon we need to deploy, whether designing single or multiple products. Because branding is not well used by most Asian manufacturers, it offers an opportunity to US and other competitors. Many Asian manufacturers tend to focus on single products and apply branding only on a superficial level, customizing a generic common platform by changing only color and graphics. For an OEM, this is a good business model, but one size does not fit all: To create long-term brand awareness and loyalty the application of design has to go further than skin deep. The key to creating a brand is to understand the visual and tactile perception of the market involved. Being located within the target market gives us a natural advantage that we should actively capitalize on and, in doing so, elevate the services of our profession.



Designing for Global Appeal
(article by Paul Hatch Appliance Design)

Creating a multinational product needs more than technical adaptations.
In this environment of international trade barriers opening up and national companies merging or being swallowed by multinational companies, designing an appliance to sell to a wider target market has become more important than ever before. But there are many stumbling blocks that companies find when launching their best-selling US product in Europe.......

.....read the rest of the article on  Appliance Design's website

Brand Differentiation through Design Details
(Housewares Show 2003)

Chicago's Paul Hatch was one of the speakers at the 2003 Housewares Show. His presentation focussed on the importance of creating a recognizable Brand Identity across a product line, and how this can be achieved by the use of styling details on the products themselves.

Very often 'Brand Identity' gets mistakenly limited to just the color and graphics of products. Paul Hatch explained in his presentation about how fine design details can radically change the appearance of a shape, and how these can be combined to create a recognizable brand identity throughout a family of products.

Paul’s presentation demonstrated how common physical details (such as use of grooves, edges and radii, etc.) can give a better emotional attachment to a whole brand, while also refining the aesthetic appeal of individual products. These details were identified and explained, and shown in context on existing products. Many products were shown with and without such defining detailing. The difference is stark; a ‘naked’ product (one without such attention to detail) suddenly looses its identity and cannot retain its emotional connection to the user or to the brand identity.

His presentation explained ways to remedy this ‘nakedness’, and how to revitalize a full product pallet, thus strengthening an entire brand.

"The strengthening of a brand through its products is fundamental to the survival of a company in the new marketplace. Industrial design can be the key to cost-efficiently boost the sales power of any product, and thus should be used with regard to the entire brand. Companies offering a cohesively designed product pallet have the ability to become a major presence in their market, an effect that has long-term rewards."

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