Noted: Reinventing the plastic bottle
Thu, Mar 26, 09
From Advertising Age:
Because he was frustrated that plastic beverage bottles could not easily be stacked in a refrigerator, Finnish industrial designer Stephan Linfoss created the donut-shaped bottle…
The branded Plup Lähdevesi spring water is currently marketed only in Finland, with every bottle sold €0.10 going towards cleaning the Baltic sea.
AdAge also includes a short video interview with Linfoss:
Fri, Apr 3, 09 at 12:46 PM
Nice article here on Dell trying to reinvent the cheap laptop with a Nike designer. Degrading a little into Mac v PC, and not helped by my experimentation with Bold and Italic, but interesting nonetheless.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20090402.wadhocracy0403/BNStory/robMarketing/home
Fri, Apr 3, 09 at 3:40 PM
“40 per cent of consumers surveyed by the company said they would not buy a PC unless they could caress it.”
With research like that who needs Apple! :-)
Thu, Mar 26, 09 at 11:05 AM
Given that the inventor’s goal seems to be awareness for his cause and charity money for same, it seems like a successful product.
However, I notice that the video does not cover some things that might be considered basic design parameters for a bottle of liquid. How is it for actually drinking out of for instance? How would you ever clean it for re-use?
Other than the “more space in your fridge” argument (which is a bit weak anyway), it doesn’t seem to solve any problems that regular water bottles have or provide any advantages over and above those.
I see this as a triumph of marketing and packaging, not water bottle design.
Thu, Mar 26, 09 at 8:26 AM
These bottles cannot be recycled, and they cost 2,40€ (0,4l) a bottle. That’s quite a lot for bottled tap water.
In 2008, Plup Lähdevesi was elected as the “useless product of the year”. ( http://www.suomenluonto.fi/arkisto/9-08/pantiton-on-turhake/?searchterm=vuoden%20turhake , in Finnish only, sorry).