[Stoves] Fwd: business sickness

Philip Lloyd plloyd at mweb.co.za
Thu Jul 7 17:29:15 CDT 2016


There is an alternative - we can produce what they really, really desire.

 

My example is a community of 3 000 households with a monthly household
income of around $500 in purchasing power parity. The poorest used a
coal-fired stove made of found materials.  As they developed sources of
income, they bought a Real Coal Stove, a cast-iron appliance of 19th century
design which enabled you to cook, boil water, burn refuse, heat the home,
and provide a social focus for family and friends. The cost was around
$2000, and there was local microfinance to make it "affordable".

 

Affordability is a poor measure of utility.

 

Philip Lloyd

Energy Institute, CPUT

SARETEC, Sachs Circle

Bellville

Tel 021 959 4323

Cell 083 441 5247

PA Nadia 021 959 4330

 

 

 

 

 

From: Stoves [mailto:stoves-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org] On Behalf Of
Xavier Brandao
Sent: Thursday, July 7, 2016 5:00 PM
To: stoves at lists.bioenergylists.org
Subject: [Stoves] Fwd: business sickness

 

"we can leave them out
we can sell them a stove they can afford that they will abandon
we can subsidize their purchase."

I agree with Crispin, there is (at least) another choice, do more with less
(materials and production processes) and the help of universities and
engineers is where to look for.
This is an engineering challenge, this is how products get better and
better, cheaper and cheaper. Again, (much) more R&D needed.

I was mentioning the size of the stove as a major element of the perceived
value. The goal can also be to increase the size of the stove while keeping
the costs low.
We tend to underestimate how big the customers want the stoves. Improved
cookstoves are often quite small. And when finally a larger version is made,
it is called "big size, supersize, jumbo" but in fact, designers should
really admit to themselves that: they have just finally designed the normal
size people want! The previous stoves were just too small.

In Europe, everyone has gas stoves with ovens, their height is at the waist
level. They are big and large, but no one would think to call them supersize
or jumbo.
They just have the size that is fit to their purpose.

Best,

Xavier


On 7/4/16 11:30 PM, stoves-request at lists.bioenergylists.org wrote:

we can leave them out
we can sell them a stove they can afford that they will abandon
we can subsidize their purchase.

 

 

-- 
Xavier Brandao
COO
 
Prakti
T  +91 413 262 34 37
M  +91 997 610 69 21
S  x.brandao
W  www.praktidesign.com
A  Spirit Sense, Old Auroville Rd,
   605 104, Bommiyarpalayam, Tamil Nadu
   INDIA
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