by Chris Eigner and Ildikó Tóth
Intended Users
This prototype is an iPhone case with a pocket for credit cards, intended for anyone burdened by having too many personables and not enough hands, including students, professionals, or travelers. We attempted to construct a phone case with a sleeve or pocket for commonly needed cards.
Usage Guide
Our first attempt was constructed from tape and cardboard. It ended up being bulky and didn’t convey the idea very well.
The next iteration of our prototype was built using an Origami mesh material. This too proved less than ideal but the idea was starting to take shape.
We constructed corner tabs to keep the cards in place, but had trouble affixing the small piece of mesh to the phone case.
We finally settled on a paper-wax like material that is often used as larger envelope material. New corner tabs were fashioned and shaded with black sharpie.
Here it is shown with the iphone inside the case
We were able to fit 3 cards in the sleeve, ample space for the bare necessities.
Estimated Costs:
- iPhone case ($8.18 per unit)
Elastic ($0.96 per unit)
Cost per unit: case + elastic = $9.14
Benefits
Under the assumption that it’s easier to manage a single thing that it is two, the benefit of this product is that it consolidates two items that are typically cumbersome to manage into a single unit.
Areas of improvement
The biggest area for improvement is the sleeve material. The next version would likely be made using elastic. A tight elastic band would be more effective at holding the cards and have the added side effect that the more cards you store, the stronger the hold on the items.
Another enhancement would be to make the inside of the elastic a rubbery-sticky surface to further prevent loss of cards. A non-stick surface on the underside of the elastic would help ensure cards don’t fall out during use.
The addition of a touch-toggle status LED would also allow the unit to act as a status indicator for availability. If the user is busy, he/she toggles the LED to red and places his phone in plain sight. When he/she becomes available, the LED is toggled back to green to signal those around that they are available to talk or collaborate.