RISK OF SHOWERS

Methven is fighting back after half a decade of financial losses. It hopes its new halo shower will help turn profitability around. But development wasn't all smooth sailing

WHEN KIWI TAPWARE company Methven announced a $5.7 million profit for the year ended March 2015, it was the first major good news on the financial front for five years. Profits were up 21% on the back of a Chinese acquisition and improved results in Australia.

But announcing the result last month, CEO David Banfield also stressed that $3.19 million-worth of “future-focussed projects” would play a key role in the ongoing success of the company. A significant part of that is the development of a new patented shower spray technology, Aurajet, launched in March.

Look at showering from an outsider’s perspective and it’s hard to imagine there’s too much new product innovation left in that space. You turn on the mixer, shed your clothes, and hop in. Not so, says Scott Fitzsimons, Methven’s head of design; the challenge was to reinvent something most people wouldn’t think needed reinventing.

The Dunedin-based group, in business since 1886 and listed on the NZX since 2007, spent three years on R&D for Aurajet.

Instead of having a solid head, the Aurajet is shaped like a basketball hoop, and designed so hidden nozzles generate water jets that collide against the head's angled surfaces. Methven says this creates 20% more spray force and twice the amount of water- on-skin contact of a normal shower – without using extra water.

HARD YAKKA

This innovation didn’t come about by accident, says Methven’s R&D head Jeremy Gear. The company devoted thousands of hours to interviews and consumer research; understanding what people wanted.

“Having empathy for your user is paramount,” says Gear. “Two key things kept coming up: people want bathroom products that both look amazing and perform well.”

Methven’s 20-strong project team included designers, development and production engineers, standards specialists, technology specialists and tool-room and plastics manufacturers.

Consumer testing in Australasia and the UK benchmarked the Aurajet against competitor products, and blind consumer testing saw it out-perform all other spray types, Gear says.

THE DESIGN PROCESS

Fitzsimons says Methven generally follows a structured design and development process, although with room for flexibility.

“You have to be prepared to adapt and change direction, which this project pushed us to do,” he says. “The first concept sketches and prototypes for the Aurajet spray technology were conceived three and a half years ago. We continued to develop the concept for 18 months to prove that it was going to perform before we kicked off a two-year formal design and development project where we refined the product down to its purest form.”

All in all, the company spent $1.2 million in development and tooling, not including marketing and commercialisation costs.

DEATH AND OTHER CHALLENGES

It wasn’t all smooth sailing.

“Probably the most obvious challenge was developing a spray pattern that closed up the hole… so we had a completely consistent spray distribution with no gaps. We probably tested over 200 different iterations of the spray pattern using both pressure-sensing pads and the best sensor there is – our consumers’ skin,” Fitzsimons says.

Then the design team worked through hundreds more prototypes to adjust factors such as nozzle diameter and the deflection angle of the spray to increase its force.

“We never faltered in our belief in this product, but it definitely challenged us.”

Then there was a totally unexpected setback: the sudden death of design director Kent Sneddon. This was a tough one, as “[Sneddon] was pivotal in the transformation of Methven into a design-led company and had led the team during the conception and development of Aurajet Aio,” Fitzsimons says.

IP MATTERS

Methven owns two of the five global shower spray technology patents, and intellectual propery protection is critical, Gear says. The key thing is to start thinking about it at the start of the development process – not as an add on.

“You need enough expertise inside your company to know you have something patentable, then work with an expert.” And make sure you have an IP strategy. “Sometimes patenting isn’t the right thing to do. And then if your patent it is too broad it may be non- defendable.”