A radical new product concept has just been announced by Ambidexx and it calls into question the way people have traditionally used their hands for working. The products improve performance, reduce fatigue and protect hands for a multitude of everyday work related tasks.
Autoglym, a "premium" well respected brand has launched the first Ambidexx products into the UK car care market with the "Perfect Palm Applicator" and "Perfect Palm Polisher." Like all Ambidexx products, they stay on the hand with no gripping and conform easily to any surface, improving efficiency, coverage and the quality of final results.
The company behind the products is a consortium of "expert organisations" covering everything from product design development and intellectual property to material science and high volume production. The innovation has been trialed by multi national FMCG companies who have all contributed to the final design and ensured that it's wholly driven by customer needs.
The product concept has been developed to offer "solutions" in many markets and the company is currently in discussion with brand owners to demonstrate how the essential elements of the ambidextrous hand interface, which fit 95% of adults, are easily customised for specific application requirements. These cover everything from healthcare and cleaning to DIY - offering the opportunity to change customer perception and improve sales of consumables by the use of genuine innovation.
Product design and development has been the responsibility of award winning design consultancy, London Associates. "We get many approaches from inventors who all think they have the best idea since 'sliced bread' but in this instance it really was," commented Les Stokes, LA partner. "The problem was one of how to achieve it at the right cost? With normal hand held products, for instance cleaning cloths, the action of gripping greatly impairs the hands natural dexterity and also reduces the effective surface contact. The Ambidexx product had to be extremely light, very flexible, and easy to pick up and put down but would stay with the hand with no effort. This was no easy task and has taken years of design, prototyping, testing and user trials. The good news is that we now have a great solution."
Manufacturing is being undertaken by Ambidexx consortium member, Trocellen Gmbh in Germany. The company has developed a number of application specific materials and a flexible production facility capable of dealing with fast tooling changes and lamination for different substrates. This ensures that cost effective manufacture can take place with each variation of the Ambidexx form. "It's always very rewarding to see a difficult design and production challenge coming to market so effectively," added Mike Rust, chief marketing officer at Trocellen. "We are very pleased to see these first two product iterations of Ambidexx selling so well and look forward to working with the Ambidexx team to bring the next range of products to market."
The Ambidexx form has been developed with ergonomics at the forefront of the design philosophy. It is truly an "inclusive" product and offers people with impaired hand dexterity the possibility to engage once again with normal cleaning or DIY tasks. For others it simply makes tasks much easier and more productive whilst reducing strain and the possibility for damaging hands and finger nails.
The opportunities for brand owners are almost limitless as Ambidexx becomes the new way of working and applying consumables.