Grip Equipment
(Case study under construction, much more content coming)
Roles: Founder, User Researcher, Product Designer, Graphic Designer, etc, etc, etc…
Duration: 6 years
Description
Grip Equipment is now the industry leader in disc golf bag design but it all began as a cluster of experience problems and an Industrial Design thesis project!
Grip succeeded by applying continuous design thinking to product, service, and brand interactions with all users, sponsored athletes, vendors, and suppliers.
The Problem
Investigate the shortcomings of the classic disc golf bag – a clumsy, ungainly, glorified duffel bag – and then do it way, way better.
The Solution
Create a new breed of gear focused on elevating the entire sport through design. Incorporate ergonomic comfort, a new physical interface between player and gear, and sleek, athletic styling to stand far out from the crowd in the marketplace. Market it under a tightly polished brand with assets and touchpoints designed to set a new high mark in the sport.
“It was Justin’s innovative nature and ability to communicate and illustrate the concepts that he was looking for that shaped new product ideas and stirred the industry with new perceptions on how product should be made for the sport of disc golf both for the amateur and professional player.”
Research and Synthesis
Research Methods
Surveys with hundreds of players.
Interviews with innumberable players of all skill levels, top professional athletes (yes, there are professional disc golfers), and vendors.
Thousands of hours of observational study and ethnographic research.
Exhaustive competitive analysis.
Top Findings
Contrary to popular belief, feature sets aren’t mutually inclusive of dedication level. Most users of intricate, high-end equipment are quite casual players.
Most competing products (nearly identical across the board) are hacked and modified regularly–indicating a lack of attention to user needs. In this market, there was little to compete on except price.
No single brand had inspired the marketplace to rally behind a direction forward, nor conducted business in a way that respected the sacrifices of their brand ambassadors.
Protection vs Accessibility matrix: a little tool I developed to guide physical layout design. Users ranked the most common objects they carry by how much protection they need and how easy they have to be to access. Results plotted on a 2x2 matrix to help visualize solutions.
>> I started producing sketch models to get a feel for space and size. Although, I quickly ran into a wall in my sewing abilities. Once I realized I’d need someone with more advanced skills and domain knowledge I found a small studio in Colorado that proved to be a key partnership, MCInternational, specialized in soft goods development.
>> After meeting with Mark and Cora at MCI, and sharing all of my research, drawings, and requirements they got to work and produced our first hi-fidelity prototype. Unfortunately, as this was a genuinely all-new backpack design, this first attempt was far too bulky, boxy, and cumbersome. We had to revise it or this would never make the splash we were shooting for.
>> After a long meeting and some follow up, version two (left) was slim, sleek, and looked like the kind of product that could really surprise the sport. Along with some of the top professionals in the world we put it to the test during a two month tour. I’d call MCI with improvements and they’d ship us new prototypes (right) until we had it perfected!
>> This comparison shows the duffel-style bag with painful and ill-fitting quad-straps that was the state of the art prior to the creation of the Grip Equipment Tour Bag, and the right shows the athletic and sleek vision that my research revealed would outmode it.
In addition to the insights I gained about the market for the product, I also gained many insights about the professional and retail sides of the industry. Some of the major points I focused on in order to do business in new ways that would benefit the sport and curry favor among our pro team and retail partners:
Stipends for sponsored athletes: Now a common practice, until Grip came along, sponsored athletes received monetary compensation from sponsors in the form of performance bonuses which only increase the grind and stress a player experiences week-in and week-out. We payed players a flat stipend every month that they could rely on to help them travel.
Contracts with sponsored athletes: Prior to Grip, no brands were creating formal contracts with their athletes about their sponsorship deals. This formal step helped create an elevated level of professionalism surrounding the brand carried forward into the sport by these all-important brand representatives. Sponsorship contracts are also now common practice in the sport.
Online ordering website for dealers: Every dealer I spoke to had trouble getting product from our competitors due to human processing constraints with other competing vendors. We created an entire password protected side of our website that allowed our dealers to order whatever product we had available at any time of day or night, always fulfilled by our warehouse no later than the next day (same day for orders before 2PM).
Brand and sales guides: We were the first in the industry to create catalogs just for our retailers in order to educate them on our brand, our product features, and best sales practices.