First Prize: "Dirty Dish Mat", Meghan McNeil (Grand Rapids, MI)
Second Prize: "Legada Fruit Spire", Brad Gressel (Columbus, IN)
Third Prizes
"Grocery Bag Bin", Jonathan Stebila (Allen Park, MI)
"scoop + serve dog dish", Nicole van der Lugt (Eagan, MN)
The simple solutions design competition encourages creative problem-solving among students for everyday household products through product design. Students at all NASAD-accredited schools are invited to design a new and innovative design, technology, or concept for making household chores easier and more intuitive. The design improvement can be applied to any basic household task, whether it's organizing clutter or washing the dishes. The design can be completely original or an improvement upon any part of a task.
Rules and Regulations
Simplehuman retains sole ownership of the student competition, list of participants, confidential information, the contest name, and the resulting archive of submissions. Each copy of the individual submission documents shall remain the property of simplehuman; however, 3-D models shall be returned to the submitter by simplehuman. The exception to this rule is the models submitted by winning students, which may be held by simplehuman for display. Models put on display by simplehuman will be returned to students after the display period. simplehuman cannot be held liable for 3-D models damaged in transit, during judging, or through normal handling.
Entrants will only submit entries that are original concepts of his or her own design, and will provide information in their applications that is true and correct. simplehuman assumes that all entry materials and photos are free of copyright infringement and that the entrant has secured permission for submitted entries to appear in simplehuman publications, displays, and on www.simplehuman.com.
All participating students retain right, title and interest to their designs and the intellectual property contained within their submissions. simplehuman shall retain a right of first negotiation (a first option) to obtain an exclusive or non-exclusive license to any intellectual property rights associated with the submissions.
Additionally, simplehuman retains the right to publicly display any submissions at any public trade shows or conventions. Entries are exclusive and may not be entered in other competitions. Entry rules shall reflect the first option and publicity clauses of this paragraph.
Judging
Entries will be judged by a jury consisting of Frank Yang, simplehuman CEO, and other design leaders, educators and media professionals.
Judges will score each entry according to the 5 following criteria:
1. Utility: usefulness of the product.
2. Efficiency: how the product makes a household task faster, simpler, and easier than conventional methods.
3. Innovation: unique and innovative qualities of the product, and how it solves an existing design problem.
4. Research: entrant's analysis of design and market research, human factors, and competitive product evaluations conducted for the project.
5. Aesthetics: the aesthetic appeal of the product.
Awards
First Prize - 5.000 Dollars scholarship
Second Prize - 500 Dollars simplehuman gift certificate
Third Prize - 250 Dollars simplehuman gift certificate
The winning concept may be prototyped and placed on exhibit at the simplehuman store or at other events, and could possibly be introduced into a future product line at simplehuman. Award winners will also be announced on the simplehuman website and the simplehuman blog.
Deadline
29 February 2008