Product Pitch: SMART CLOSET
Have you ever come home feeling overwhelmed with a machine full of clothes to fold or
found yourself often running late while trying to find the perfect outfit? No need to worry, I have
a solution for all of that. I am presenting you with my long-developed “SMART CLOSET” after
3 years of careful, intricate research and design. The reason behind creating SMART CLOSET
was that there are often times when I felt so overwhelmed when coming home late with a big pile
of unfolded clothes. I wanted to create something that can take care of all of the laundries in an
instance, fast & relaxed manner. SMART CLOSET is the perfect machine that will satisfy
consumers’ needs of not needing to worry about the hassles of dealing with laundry at all.
To further identify and segment my target market, I have performed some market
research using a customer-centric approach. According to the website MIC “ People hate folding
clothes so much they've pledged over $70,000 for a Kickstarter”, unquestionably this indicates
that there is a large unsatisfied need here. Consumers are willing to invest in a Kickstarter which
implies that they are not as price-sensitive if a product can be invented to solve the problem. In
combination, referring to How much time we spent on doing laundry researched by Red Hanger
Cleaners, “an average person spends 260 minutes per week on laundry, that's roughly equivalent
to four hours”, hence a product that can greatly reduce the time spent on laundry will be a great
selling point to the consumers. From a blog named 15 reasons I hate folding laundry, some
reasons identified were “there are too much of it, I have a baby, and it is wrinkled already”,
many consumers have a busy lifestyle, a product that can minimize the workload is deemed
desirable to the consumers. Additionally, I have investigated consumer behaviours and
discovered “average women spend 16 minutes every weekday morning deciding what to wear
and around 14 minutes on a Saturday or Sunday morning”, from this we can see that consumers
spend a fair amount of time choosing an outfit each day. Taking these factors into consideration,
we must create a product that can bring value to the consumers. From all this research, I have
recognized that consumers wish to minimize the time, effort spent on the laundries and choosing
outfits. Following the consumer decision process, when consumers are buying a product, they are
likely to perform information search and compare different options; hence SMART CLOSET’s
vision is to be the market leader which will bring the best and most innovative product to
consumers by making the laundry cycle worry-free, effective and efficient.
This led to whom I have chosen to be my two main target markets; the elderly (65 and
above) and people who have a busy lifestyle (demographics between 30 and 50). As a way to
target elders, I have made the usage of the machine fairly simple with just a few buttons and
functions because I recognized that many are not familiar with technologies. Consumers can
dump all the clothes into the feeder of the machine, then the machine will automatically start the
laundry cycle. Which will do all the washing, drying, folding and organizing all in one. After
that, the machine will automatically sort the product into their department (eg. T-shirts, jackets,
pants, shorts etc). This not only solves the problem of not liking to fold laundries, and it has
taken care of all other steps from washing the laundry to organizing in the closet all-in-one. More
importantly, the regular washers we have right now are not as sufficient as many of the elders
have troubles carrying heaving laundries from the washer to the dryer. From my daily
observations, I have seen many elders suffers from arthritis, joint pains, back pains etc, and
heavy chores will worsen their physical health. They can likely injure themselves carrying
laundries around. Therefore, having the washer and dryer together in combination with
automation of folding clothes reduces their need for standing too long, transferring clothes from
place to place, and preventing too many heavy and repetitive motions. Compared to the existing
laundry cycle, it takes 4 procedures to finish (washing, drying, folding, organizing), it has now
been reduced to a single step (dropping the dirty clothes into the machine), thus I believe that
SMART CLOSET will drastically reduce the workload for elders, consequently, reduces their
chances of getting hurt. It is also beneficial to those who have a busy lifestyle, for example, a
working mom, or full-time employee (35-50 years olds). By having this machine, people will
free up 4 hours of their week doing something more valuable and enjoyable (more family time,
self-care, going on dates etc). The second feature of this machine (consumers can get daily
recommended outfits of the day based on the occasion, preferences and weather) is created based
on the needs of this target market. Many find themselves running late in the morning trying to
select clothes, and working mom has 3 kids she needs to dress for school; a machine that can
pre-select clothes ahead of time is the best solution. The first step, when you purchase a piece of
garment, you will input that item into the system, for example: where you purchase it, what
colour is the product, what product type etc. Then the system does a scan to analyze what it pairs
well with. Secondly, consumers will be able to access outfit suggestions on the mobile app any
time of the day they want and anywhere. For example: if you click occasions, then select
business casuals, it will give you 4-5 different outfits. Consumers will be able to enjoy new
pairing options every day. It will also be able to match the outfit with the appropriate weather,
for example: if it's rainy outside, it will suggest something waterproof, if it is sunny, it will
suggest clothing with Ultra-Violet Light blockage. Currently, we need to check on our phone or
the radio to know the weather outside, and now that we have a weather feature inclusive with the
machine; it will reduce the extra step and time to check elsewhere. Those with a busy lifestyle
will majorly benefit from purchasing SMART CLOSET because of its practicality and time
convenience.
Not to mention that there are direct competitors with SMART CLOSET. There are some
manual laundry folding prototypes sold on Amazon, the main feature is to reduce time on folding
laundry and it helps fold very nicely and organized. Another competitor would be dry cleaners,
and consumers will only need to drop off their laundry. The downside of the dry-cleaners is that
the cost is high. By understanding who the competitors are and the services they SMART
CLOSET’s competitive advantage is time convenience (no need to go bring clothes to drycleaners), cost efficiency (one time purchase compared to weekly dry cleaner fees), reduce
workload (automatic folding and organizing vs manual folding). We strive to be the market
leader in this laundry industry, constantly observing the moves of competitors and changes in
consumer behaviours & needs. By including all the competitive advantages from competitors
when creating SMART CLOSET, outstandingly, SMART CLOSET will be the finest option on
the market.
Ultimately, the creation of SMART CLOSET is an easy-to-use & all-in-one machine
dedicated to helping reduce the time and effort spent on laundry. Not only consumers will be
able to free up more time on more enjoyable activities, and less worrying on never-ending
clothing chores. They will also experience the SMART & creative clothing selection pairing
features of the machine. SMART CLOSET is truly the machine everyone needs to have in their
home, an advantageous solution to solve the hatred for laundry.
Work Cited
Avila, T. (2015, November 13). People hate folding clothes so much they've pledged over
$70,000 for a Kickstarter. Mic. Retrieved February 10, 2022, from
https://www.mic.com/articles/128462/people-hate-folding-clothes-so-much-they-ve-pledgedover-70-000-for-a-kickstarter
A clothes case. The Dirt Company. (n.d.). Retrieved February 7, 2022, from
https://thedirtcompany.com.au/blogs/dive-in/a-clothescase#:~:text=According%20to%20the%20study%20master,above%20figure%20to%2020%20mi
nutes
Hemmert, D. (2021, September 2). How much time do we spend doing laundry? Red Hanger.
Retrieved February 9, 2022, from https://redhanger.com/how-much-time-do-we-spend-doinglaundry/
Janie, & Janie, W. by. (2016, March 7). 15 reasons I hate folding laundry. - Finding joy +
purpose in the mothering trenches. Retrieved February 8, 2022, from
https://shejustglows.com/2015/11/15-reasons-hate-folding-laundry/