Doesn't that already exists?
Perhaps as a designer you have experienced it, you are at a party and you introduce yourself to someone you don’t know yet. It is a fun conversation and after the second drink the other drops the question: "And what do you do in daily life?". As a proud designer you are happy to let them know you are a designer and where you work. "Okay cool! And what kind of products do you design? ". You tell them which project you are currently working on and then you hear that terrible comment: "But doesn't that already exist?".
The world changes every second and so do products. In fashion, for example, it is quite common to transform your wardrobe every year to keep up with the trends. Design is a motivation to buy a new shirt.
Industrial (product) designers, just like fashion designers, are continuously working on optimizing their products. This happens at both design agencies and at internal R&D departments (or a combination). However, here ist he difference between fashion and products; a good designer will always try to improve a product in many other aspects as well as design. This improvement can be anything, for example that the new product has more functions or that the ease of use has been improved. Fortunately, these days people are also working on optimizing products in terms of carbon footprint and environmental impact. As a designer you always try to design a product with an optimal lifespan. It is also smart to think about what happens to the product if it does reach its end of life. For example, by having the product come back in a new product life cycle, via recycling or reuse (this is a very interesting topic that we will discuss in more detail later).
The job of a designer is more than designing products that already exist. We are constantly working on optimizing, new insights, unique production methods and we think about the environment and the user.
As designers at Fabrique Invent, we are allowed to work on all kinds of different products and we are challenged every time to come up with new, innovative solutions.