Sick of pancake-thin brownies because your pan was too large or just tired of having more batter than your small pan can fit?  Let Ribbon expand the ways you bake!  The Ribbon is a modular baking pan that allows you to control the shape and the size of the baking area.  Using the silicone band that attaches to the steel baking sheet with magnets, you can shape the baking area to fit the needs of your recipe and create different shaped molds for your cakes, brownies, and your most decadent desires.  Ding! When you’re done baking simply peel away the silicone band to unleash those delicious treats!

Ryan C. knew there had to be a better way than having to always purchase new pans for different recipes.  To solve this he created an adjustable baking pan that can be used for all his baking needs.  The Quirky design staff along with over 2490 influencers came together to make Ribbon a must-have product for your kitchen.  Check it out in the Upcoming section now.

Features:
-Relief slits on silicone band allowing easy manipulation
-Band peels away to easily remove baked goods
-Max. volume comparable to 9in x 9in baking pan
-Durable steel baking sheet with Teflon coating (can be used separately)

Materials:
-Modular band: Silicone
-Baking Sheet: Teflon coated steel

Dimensions:
-438mm w x 353mm l x 15.5mm h

Price, qty and features subject to change during production process

Unhampered

During the Summer of 2011, we took an injected plastic version through tooling and initial mold tests. The results were passable and the product functioned relatively well after iterative tooling modifications. However, we were not satisfied with the product quality or the accumulative thickness of the plastic pieces when stored. We made the tough decision to abandon this approach and explore other material options.

We are currently exploring various manufacturing techniques to figure out which one will be the most effective way of executing the concept. Firstly, we are working closely with cut and sew manufacturers to explore how we can layer waterproof fabrics, stiffener material and foams to achieve the specified performance. One important activity with soft goods is to balance out achieving the desired performance with labor, material, time and complexity involved. In the case of Unhampered, some approaches require too much time to manufacture (mostly due sewing through the stiffening boards). Other approaches required too much fabric due to layering and are therefore cost prohibitive.

Going forward, we will be exploring other processes in parallel, such as die-cutting sheet plastic.

Boil Buoy

The boil buoy’s engineering work has been finalized.  Our engineers were exploring all of the aspects of the sound that the Boil Buoy could produce. They looked into the decibel levels (loudness) along with the tone of the sound produced.  The engineers needed to make sure that the decibel level was loud enough for a person to be properly notified when the water reached a boil.

The two major scenarios of when a person is boiling water are when the lid is on and when the lid is off.  At first, they wanted to make the chirp loud enough so that even with the lid on, the noise wouldn’t get drowned out.  When they increased the volume for this scenario, they noticed that when they took the lid off it was way too loud.  So rather than having the chirp be alarm-like, causing ringing in the users ear, they believed that it was necessary to reduce the volume for the user’s sake.  More people would rather leave the lid off when boiling water than have ear damage.

Knowing what decibel level the Boil Buoy would be, enabled us to know what circuit board and battery will go into the product.  Having this knowledge, we then received quotes from our manufacturers, agreed on the price of all the parts, and we will now start the tooling phase of the product development process.

We’ll, we’ve got good news and other good news.

We’ve decided to hold off on having a Q4 Town Meeting until the end of January, for two very good reasons.

1. We want to be able to provide you with end of year data, which won’t be available until the books are closed in mid January.

2. We’ve got this new office that you might have heard about, which right now is a construction site, but in 5 weeks will be one of the awesomest offices on the East Coast.

So that’s the good news.

The other good news is that we got you all a Hanukkah present!

Next Wednesday at 5:30pm EST, we’re going to have a no holds barred Q&A with Ben Kaufman and whoever else you want to talk to (pending availability).

So, come up with awesome, hard hitting questions and we’ll answer them.

Post your questions here or in this forum thread.

Cheers!

It’s time to get baked! Introducing Batch – the connectable cupcake tray. Batch features individual cupcake tins that can be easily assembled in a variety of configurations. Whether you’re whipping up two treats or twenty, sliding the tins together is a snap. Quickly disassemble Batch for cleaning and stack the tins for efficient storage.

Brian Erickson knew that cupcakes were all the rage, but cupcake tins were space-wasters. He proposed a solution – individual tins that connect and stack. Quirky is always willing to promote cupcake awareness, so we gladly gave him a hand. Over 993 influencers came together to develop Brian’s idea. The result is Batch, which you can find right now in the Upcoming section.

Features:
-Six tins per set
-Each tin slides and locks into place; sturdy enough for one-handed use
-Use with almost any size oven (even toaster ovens!)
-Easy to clean – dishwasher safe
-Stack tins to save space

Materials:
-Lightweight (65g), non-stick steel tins

Dimensions:
-110mm w x 110mm d x 34.5mm h

Quantity and features subject to change during production process.

Imants Caklais is a designer of architectural scale models and resides in Latvia.  Originally Imants set out to design the ultimate indestructible bike lock but quickly learned that this would be almost impossible to make.  He came to the conclusion that bike locks don’t necessarily have to be impenetrable but they should at least be time-consuming for the robber to take off.  His invention idea has three bike lock straps that connect to one unit.  This main unit can lock and unlock all three straps.  He hopes this will save the owner time since he/she won’t have to lock three individual locks. Also, he hopes it will deter the robber from taking the bike, since it would take too long to cut all three straps.

The design team thought that this was a great product idea for an annoying problem.  They think there is a lot of potential providing that we can keep the weight down.  The marketing team said that this seems like an interesting problem to solve.  They hope that this will have mass appeal.  The viability team will want to partner with a vendor with experience making locks to design the internals.  They said protection seems available for the multi-lock/multi-cable concept if implemented in an innovative manner.

Michael Muscarella is a Group Creative Director from Virginia. When Michael’s son was a little younger, he loved to build Cardboard structures, everything from forts to space shuttles.  The problem was, there is no easy way to connect the cardboard pieces together without making it so difficult to take the structure apart when it is done being played with.  Now that Michael’s younger daughter is starting to make cardboard structures of her own, Michael and his son were determined to find a solution. They came up with a flexible structure that holds the cardboard in place that works better than duct tape, which is frustrating to work with, or rivets for cardboard, which are hard to remove from the cardboard. It works as a frame that supports the cardboard, but it would adjust to whatever angle is desired.

Cardboard boxes are so wasteful, so the Quirky design team loved the idea of finding a new use for them while also giving kids a creative outlet.  The multi-angled connectors can allow kids to use leftover boxes and ripped pieces of cardboard, that cannot be used as boxes any more, to build different cardboard constructions.  It is a simple idea that can be re-used with ease because it does not have to be ripped out of the cardboard and it will not consist of many small parts like comparable products.

Every Wed at noon ET, QDS blows a few product ideas wide open to kick off the design process. You can take part in that. Here’s how:

1. Topics will be posted on Mon before the Wed brainstorm sesh. In your wildest dreams, what would be the perfect way to make that product? What should it do, and what problems should it prevent? It’s a brainstorm, so anything goes.

2. Visit the Quirky Brainstorm Channel at noon ET on Wed. Log in on Ustream and throw ideas at us in the live chat.

3. Can’t join the live brainstorm? Be sure to add your comments here before Wed at noon, and we’ll have them in mind.

Got all that? Great. This week’s topics are:

-3-in-1 Bike Lock

-Cardboard Connectors

We’re unbelievably psyched to announce our new relationship with Target.

We’re working on big plans for 2012 and beyond, but for starters, only 40 million homes received this week’s Target circular featuring Pivot Power and Converge. Tether and Verseur are also currently in Target nationwide.

More news to come in the new year.

(1) GENERAL
(a) Product Updates: Now Upcoming: Assist, Footnote; Into Production: Mercado, Stem
(b) Production Statuses: Please go to this thread for a summary of production status updates, and to share any updates that either you have (ideators) or find in the forums (community members). The curious and the influential want to know.
(c) Community Liaison Updates: Get digest summaries of the most important and current Quirky related news, like this one, delivered to your email inbox. Visit the new Qmunity Blog to check it out and subscribe to the email updates.
(d) Poll: Do you think that the Forum sections are imbalanced? Vote and discuss here.

(2) NEWS
(a) Time to Under Consideration slowing down: Starting Monday (12/12), it will be impossible for ideas that have been up for less than 48 hours to be placed under consideration.
(b) Ka-ching: On 12/5, Quirky paid out approximately $30k to influencers in our community!
(c) Outdated Website Content: Some of the inaccurate details in the FAQs and Learn Section is in the process of being updated.  Yes, Quirky evolves so quickly it is sometimes hard for it to keep up with itself.
(d) Teams: Quirky is hard at work researching and discussing the rules and implications around teaming up, having an individual account, etc.

(3) REMINDERS
(a) Pricing Game: Earn influence by checking in to the Upcoming Products Page weekly and answering all 4 questions (or “not my thing”) for each of the two listed products.
(b) Free Shipping: on all domestic orders over $20, until December 12th.
(c) Social Selling: Free shipping also makes it more attractive for others to buy Quirky products, so get folks to buy via your social sales link and make 10%.  This is one of the best weeks of the year to do this.

(4) COMMUNITY LIAISON PLAN
(a) Blog: Go through the blog to find and list all the relevant posts, including information about the product development process.
(b) Forum threads: Add information wikithreads on Community Ambassadors, Product Development Stages, Community Liaison, Get Satisfaction, Blog Highlights.

If you have any comments or questions not better suited for the corresponding forum thread, please email me at matt@quirkyinc.com (but please don’t use the Quirky messenger). Thanks.

We’ll be closing early tonight at 6pm so the whole team can celebrate the holidays together at our holiday party.

Get your calls and emails in before 6pm tonight if there’s a pressing matter you need handled.  If you miss us, leave a warm and fuzzy holiday message when you call or email to questions@quirky.com. We’ll be back bright and early tomorrow to continue making invention accessible!

Wish you could be there with us tonight!