May 17th, we’ll be streaming news, updates, and exciting announcements direct from Quirky HQ, including an update on the results from our Presale and Product Evaluation Task Forces. More details to come, but clear your schedules now.
Kitchen storage has never looked so good. Ridge is an elegant kitchen rail system that lets you hang your kitchenware out in the open, so you can save space in your cabinets. Ridge is completely modular, so you can mix and match the hooks and attachments to fit your needs.
Ridge was the collective brainchild of ideator Vincent Vedie and more than 600 community members. This solution is now available in the Quirky store for $94.99 presale ($99.99 retail) with a threshold of 1700.
Features:
– Nine-piece rail, hook, and attachment set.
– Use any combination of hooks and attachments to fit your kitchen storage needs.
– Easy installation: just screw the rail into the wall using the included screws, and hang your hooks and attachments.
The Ridge set comes with:
– Stamped metal rail, with an angled edge for hanging hooks and attachments.
– Utensil caddy, with holes on the bottom for allowing wet cutlery to dry.
– Knife rack, with slits for hanging multiple sizes of knives.
– Shelf/drying rack, for storing spices or drying dishes. A bottom rail flips down to hold wine glasses.
– Five hooks, for hanging miscellaneous kitchen tools.
– Screws for installation.
Rail, utensil caddy, and hooks are made of dishwasher-safe stainless steel. Knife rack and shelf/drying rack are made of bamboo and stainless steel, and should be cleaned by hand.
Dimensions:
Rail: 26.5″ x 3.5″
Product 82, Brian Wethington’s Fast-Boiling Kettle submission, has presented us with a wonderful engineering and prototyping challenge over the past couple of months. We strive to make a certain amount of selections at eval that really push us out of our comfort zone, but with the knowledge that if we get it right it will be a killer product. With this approach, you expect that there will be times that we fail.
We have approached the kettle submission from a variety of directions. Early on in the process, we expected that Brian’s clever core concept of an internal chimney was a strong direction for open flame heating, but inherently inefficient for electric stoves. Shutting out a huge proportion of the market was unacceptable, so this concept was out of the window. We began to work our way through a variety of options, including introducing internal heat sinks, various insulating methods, internal copper heat-distribution piping. Prototyping these concepts led to some fairly creative use of copper heat pipes, computer heat sinks, and even copper deck screws!
Alas, after much testing on the stoves of the Quirky workshop, we got no closer to finding a disruptively innovative solution (i.e. a significantly faster boiling time).
After spending many hours prototyping, our gut feeling was that, even with continued testing and mock-ups, we would get no closer to our elusive goal. It was time to make a tough decision. We felt that it was a simple choice between two outcomes: Option 1: kill the project. Option 2: go ahead with a Quirky-branded kettle and open it up to the community to ideate on what the core concept could be, with Brian taking a reduced influence. We felt it incredibly important that the final decision came from Mr. Wethington himself, so early this morning (even earlier for Portland-based Brian), we called him up to explain the situation and get his decision.
Brian has decided that he would like the project to be opened up to the community and has graciously accepted a reduced influence percentage. So, very soon we will be launching the concept phase for this product, and will be hoping the community can help us to come up with a core concept that is ‘disruptively innovative’ and cause a genuine paradigm shift in the kettle market.
So you did it. You just shelled out several hundred bucks for the iPad 2. You want the world to know, but you also want protect it. The Smart Cover is great and all, but it leaves the back of your ‘Pad a little, well, naked. Other cases cover the entire iPad 2, but you haven’t found one that’s quite your cup of tea. What to do?
We have a solution: Fender, a clear plastic bumper that protects your iPad 2’s sides and corners, without encasing the entire unit. Fender complements and is fully functional with the Apple Smart Cover, for times when you also need front coverage.
Rene Diaz (“Gyro”) submitted this idea to our iPad 2 accessories brief, Vincent Vedie contributed the design, and 636 influencers chipped in to make it a reality. Fender is now available in the Quirky store for $18 presale ($20 retail) with a threshold of 1000. Congratulations to all!
Features:
– Made of clear frosted ABS plastic with grey rubber corners and a thin grey rubber border on the back.
– Snaps in place to fit the iPad 2.
– Rubber corners protect from bumps and falls, while a rubber border grips tabletops.
– Fully functional with the Apple Smart Cover.
Dimensions:
7.5″ x 9.75″ (designed to fit the iPad 2)
There hasn’t been much innovation in garment upkeep since the invention of the lint brush. This week, we’re going to change that.
Let’s make a product that helps you care for and maintain your garments.
In this brief, we’re going to attack dryer lint, pet hair, cotton fuzz, and everything else that keeps your clothes from looking the best they possibly can. Let’s create solution-oriented products that help your clothes keep longer, so you can get more use out of them. Consider the wide variety of fibers and materials out there, as well as the different methods of upkeep.
Deadline for submissions is Monday, May 2, at 12 noon ET and submissions are free! Submit your idea here.
Congratulations to our two eval selections this week, announced live on HSN!
Eval 123 (regular eval)
Selected: Car Wash Sponge System
Inventor: Jim Siegrist
Picked as a wild card, this submission was an interesting twist on car cleaning. Market felt that it has mass appeal, and Design is interested in its potential as a line extension to Sudsi. We think there is plenty for the community to get involved with here, and now that it is warming up a bit, everyone can get outside and experiment with ways to improve Jim’s submission.
Eval 124 (Paper Towel Holder brief)
Selected: Spin And Lock Holder
Inventor: Gideon Weinwerth
This stimulated a lot of debate. It’s a complex patent landscape when it comes to mechanized paper towel holders, but we felt this submission was a great starting point. Recently, two extremely talented engineers joined our New York office, so we are confident that we will be able to take this interesting places.
Note from Jess: From now on, we’ll be posting quick blog entries announcing each week’s winners instead of posting eval recap videos. Previous eval recap videos will still be available on the blog and YouTube, and they’re a great resource for those seeking to learn more about why we choose the products we choose.
Good Friday just got better.
Quirky is coming at you live on HSN today, at two time slots:
9:20am ET & 1pm ET
Quirky founder Ben Kaufman will be showing off new products and old favorites to a worldwide audience of millions to kick off HSN Innovation Weekend.
We will be chatting throughout the show on Twitter using hashtag #QuirkyOnHSN. Join in!
Scrubbing the bathtub? So last millennium. Instead, use Sudsi for a squeaky clean bathroom, minimal effort required. Sudsi is an electric cleaning tool with three interchangeable heads, so you can polish every part of your bathroom, from your tiles to your toilet, without getting on your hands and knees.
Plus, Sudsi’s so versatile, it works outside the bathroom too. Once you see how easy it is to use, you’ll never clean manually again.
Sudsi is now available in the Quirky store for a presale price of $65.99 (retail $69.99) and a threshold of 3000. Big props to Michael Mattox a.k.a. Popeye (argh!) and the 494 community members who threw down for this product!
Features:
– Three interchangeable heads: brush for scrubbing, sponge for scouring, and microfiber cloth for polishing.
– Electric scrubber uses a back-and-forth motion with two modes: soft and hard.
– Ergonomic handle, which allows you to put more downward force on the head.
– Flexible neck, so you can maneuver the head into tight spots and hard-to-reach areas.
– Telescoping handle, which extends up to 48″.
– Head has four anchors to hold microfiber and other cleaning cloths securely.
– Rechargeable battery lasts up to 30 minutes when fully charged.
– Sturdy plastic construction, with silicone neck and rubber-coated handle.
Dimensions:
48″ extended, 23″ collapsed, 7″ tall
The tech team just rolled out several improvements to our commenting system, thanks in large part to community feedback.
New features include:
- Ability to thumbs up/down on comments, so you can “thumbs up” any comment that you find particularly constructive or insightful. Once you click on either thumb, the button will turn from grey to blue.
- Comment rating bar, to show the ratio of thumbs up/thumbs down. The bluer the bar, the more thumbs up!
- Automatically rolled out replies, to make the flow of conversation easier and more focused.
We’d love to hear what you think. Tell us in the forums!
4 hours ago
5 hours ago
7 hours ago
9 hours ago
10 hours ago
