Monday, October 31, 2005
OXO and design failures.
"We're not afraid of a slow build," says Levy. "We're designing products to last a long time."
OXO seems to have a very agile approach to product development. They go through iterations of products because a lot of things just aren't apparent until you see them in real life. For instance, they made a bagel slicer which makes slicing bagels a lest dangerous activity. When they demoed it in Chicago it was somewhat of a failure in that they hadn't designed for Chicago sized bagels (much smaller than their New York counterparts).
The cool thing is that they learned from this mistake. When they made a mango splitter they made sure to test against many varieties of mangos; not just one type. The same thing can be done in software development. When starting a new project most seasoned developers make sure to have source control available, for instance.
OXO seems to have a very agile approach to product development. They go through iterations of products because a lot of things just aren't apparent until you see them in real life. For instance, they made a bagel slicer which makes slicing bagels a lest dangerous activity. When they demoed it in Chicago it was somewhat of a failure in that they hadn't designed for Chicago sized bagels (much smaller than their New York counterparts).
The cool thing is that they learned from this mistake. When they made a mango splitter they made sure to test against many varieties of mangos; not just one type. The same thing can be done in software development. When starting a new project most seasoned developers make sure to have source control available, for instance.
Friday, October 21, 2005
I know it's been a while
But this is how I've been feeling for a while.
