Kohler
Product Development
Product Realization is a class that focuses on improving students’ knowledge of real-life design products and cross-disciplinary teams of engineering and communications students through industry sponsored projects. The industry sponsor for this project was Kohler Company, specifically the Kitchen and Bath Department.
The Challenge
Kohler currently categorizes consumers kitchen faucet needs in three different user experiences: fill, clean, and prep. Our team was challenged with developing a new kitchen faucet pulldown spray-head design that fell into one or more of Kohler’s current categories while solving a consumer need.
The Research
The first thing we needed to do before we could start was we needed to locate the problem. And what better place to look for a product problem then in the review section on the Kohler website? With that being said, scrolling through hundreds of reviews, good and bad, is where we started our research. We were looking for insights that would give us a better understanding of the consumer we were serving, their experience with Kohler products, and what they were asking for to make that experience better. In this research, we discovered a few interesting patterns that stood out among the rest and told us what our problem actually is.
The Problem?
That feedback helped us come to the conclusion that, at the end of the day, our consumers want something that is going to give them everything they love about Kohler’s current sweep function, while upgrading their experience in the kitchen and minimizing the mess that cleaning up can sometimes make.
The Insight
Knowing this insight gave us a clearer picture of who exactly our target is, both demographically and on a psychographic level. Using data from MRI Simmons and other qualitative research we were able to characterize our consumer personas into two people: Martha and Kerry. On paper, these two women have their obvious differences, but at their core they both need something that accomplishes everything they love about cooking without having to worry about everything they dislike about cleaning up once the meal has been enjoyed.
Our Solution
Through concept generation, ideation, and selection, our team recognized our solution as a planar spray. An evolution of Kohler’s current Sweep function, the planar spray would have no gaps between the water streams, covering a larger surface area in one sweep for more efficient cleaning and presumed to reduce the amount of splash back. The new function would primarily be for cleaning cutting boards, pans, and larger cooking and baking dishes more effectively, something that any amateur chef would appreciate. When paired with BerrySoft and other Kohler spray head functions, it would offer a wider range of cooking and cleaning functionality.
