Blog Post 5

Our original product is an ice shaving machine. Although Japan has a colder climate than parts of the United States, shaved ice specific deserts are enjoyed still. In fact, kakigori, a japanese shaved ice desert, is sold virtually everywhere in japan during the warm summer months. Perhaps an equivalent product would be a blender that has ice crushing features.

This shaved ice industry in japan usually was dominated by hand cranked ice machines. With the onset of electric shavers, vendors have been using electric shaved ice machines increasingly more, although hand cranks are still used by more traditional vendors.

We redesigned the product to have an optional manual hand crank that can power the ice crusher. Additionally we would add a can opener feature to the machine, with the hand crank also being able to power the can opener. This hand crank would allow for the machine to operate without power, as a hand cranked machine would allow for usage in emergency situations when no power is available.

By: Whole Team