Design Research and Strategy
Christmas shopping season is in full swing, but one retail company stands out for its message: don’t buy our stuff. That’s right, Patagonia is telling its customers that they should NOT buy more of its products. From their blog:
What kind of crazy reverse psychology is this? Is Patagonia trying to fool its customers into buying [...]
Categories: Blog · anthropology · brand · ethnography · home · market research · qualitative research
I had the privilege to work under Roger Martin when I worked at the Institute for Competitiveness and Prosperity. Roger’s got much to say about innovation, and I find his take to generally reinforce the “qualitative lens” Copernicus takes to its projects. Roger recently wrote for Harvard Business Review that companies don’t get growth from [...]
Categories: Blog · anthropology · design · ethnography · home · market research
Two of us at Copernicus (Sarah and I) are working on a project, funded through Ryerson University, on smartphone usage. One of the key findings we’ve uncovered so far is that people tend to adopt new communication channels (e.g., text) when they purchase new handsets. This new handset/life change correlation is a symbolic ritual that [...]
Categories: Blog · anthropology · culture · design · ethnography · home · market research · mobile · product design · qualitative research · sociology · technology design
I’m thrilled to be managing a research project on mobile technology use through a fellowship at the Ted Rogers School of Management at Ryerson University. I’ve assembled a research team and we have started initial research. Our “ethnographic stretching” exercise lead to some interesting insights:
“Attachment Paradox”: More than one person we talked to said that [...]
Categories: Blog · anthropology · culture · design · ethnography · home · market research · mobile · product design · qualitative research · sociology
The bane of many women’s existence appeared in today’s New York Times: irregular clothing sizes. The journalist interviewed one young woman who complained about irregular sizing:
“I can be anywhere from a 0 at Ann Taylor to a 6 at American Eagle,” she said. “It obviously makes it difficult to shop.”
The woman used a body scanner, [...]
Categories: Blog · anthropology · culture · design · product design · sociology · women