pss diary

Can be found here.

Product Service Systems: Ground for Ground pt2

Out of the three categories to choose from (food, mobility, and health) my group chose to create a product service system around the food sector. We began to brainstorm possible sectors within the food category to see which areas we could further explore. Mind maps as follows:

Our proposed system is to redistribute coffee grounds from cafes to be utilised on both a household and commercial level. The current system was mapped out in order to determine where the problem areas were.

One of the major problems associated with spent coffee grounds was the disposal. The majority of used coffee grounds were being thrown away with everyday rubbish, instead of being utilised to their full potential. A new system was mapped out to include our proposed concept:

The products in the service system are the dump bins used in cafes, the coffee ground station, and the coffee ground container. The dump bins were designed to be an improvement on the current ones used but also a multi purpose product as they double as stools. This way, the stools can be used in the cafe and with the logo being visible it promotes brand awareness. The 'Grounds to Go' station allows customers at the cafe to fill up their container with grounds and take as much or as little as they like. The 'Grounds to Go' container is conveniently sized to fit in a small handbag and seals tightly so as not to take up much space or omit odours if carried around all day.

Products:

Tech drawings:

Scenario boards:

Information booklet/starter kit:

In order to educate customers about the 'Grounds for Ground' service, the 'Ground to Go' container used for customers to take home their own grounds was accompanied by an information booklet. The booklet was part of a starter kit that customers could obtain after purchasing 5 coffees on their loyalty card. It gives customers the opportunity to start their own garden, even if they just have a couple of pot plants. The booklet is printed on seeded paper and comes with instructions so that beginner learn more gardening.

Powerpoint presentation can be found here.

Product Service Systems: Ground for Ground pt1

Reflection:

The task of designing a whole product service system rather than just a product was challenging to say the least. It was quite difficult to understand the concept of an actual product service system, I found it confusing to begin with because I understood it to be just a vending machine or kiosk. Once I understood what a PSS actually was it was difficult to begin brainstorming for original ideas that haven't been done before. Our original concepts were quite basic and didn't have much of a 'system' to them.

Industrial designers should definitely consider product service systems among their solutions as I found that it was a good experience to create a whole system, start to end rather than just one product. It's always good to know more than you need, being able to understand how a product service system works is an asset to an industrial designer. If an industrial designer is designing an interface for a product, it's important for them to understand the process from start to finish including the user interaction of the product, distribution, manufacturing, etc.

I liked the fact that there were basically endless possibilities when creating a product service system. The brief started off as relatively free until I realised what was actually involved. I think the fact that there were so many factors to consider was the most difficult part of the project. Once we figured out one part of the concept there was a myriad of other factors we had to consider. I greatly value the input we get from our tutors, but coming week to week with progress and having to change directions was also a really trying part of the project. With so many varying suggestions of what we should do, it really just made us confused on which direction to take. I would have liked to decide on a final concept well before it was due to work out any problems that occurred along the way, but this was difficult to do when even in our final week before presentation our idea was still changing.

An advantage of designing a product service system was the fact that it was so broad. We had no choice but to understand every little component that went into creating the system, from each individual product to the distribution factors, and user interaction. It definitely made us stronger designers for that.

I definitely think I learned a lot from this project, not only from our product service system, but from everyone else's as well. It was interesting to see everyone's solution to the project and considering we only had three categories to chose from everyone's projects were so different. This project also made me learn more about working in a team, although group work is often challenging I was fortunate enough to have a really solid group to work with. Everyone was always open to ideas and there were never any negative attitudes. We were able to play on everyone's strong points to ensure that everyone did an equal amount of work.