Hasta La Ideas

Written by Tony Meredith, Remy Lebesque, Cormac Eubanks, Howard Nuk, and Michael DiTullo.

Working out at home may be convenient and cost effective, but why do the machines for home use echo gym units so closely? Can a home machine be appropriate for and respond to the home environment it is meant to live within? Can we make it a source of pride so it does not become layered with laundry or relegated to the garage? The frog design team asked these types of questions when we partnered with Nautilus to take a fresh look at their Treadclimber products. Together, we tore down the existing product and built it back up to become the Mobia, more reflective of its intended environment and users and more efficient in its manufacturing process. We designed it to be visually iconic, with reduced parts and cost, and passed those benefits to a larger audience by producing it at a lower price point than its predecessor.

We spent an initial block of time in a primary and secondary research immersion by diving into competitive products, learning about the retail environment they are sold in and identifying and observing a group of home exercise users in their domestic settings. We found that the majority of existing home workout machines had finishes that tended towards dark paint and metal accents, having more in common with an assault rifle than the living room. While this look and feel might be appropriate to a high tech commercial gym where everything is focused on working out, it feels alien co-existing with a family in their personal space.

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