Testing the Hypothesis, Part 1

Apparatus for filtering smoke

·      Opportunity:

o   Every day millions if not billions of people smoke either tobacco or marijuana but must either sit outside or risk their house, car, or other area smelling like smoke.

§  The who: any kind of smoker

§  The what: They must sit outside in the heat or cold to be able to smoke

§  The why: The fact that these smoking substances smell very strong or bad and will get stuck in materials in homes or cars.

·      Testing the who: People all around the world smoke and frequently must endure harsh conditions to do so without leaving somewhere smelling awful.

·      Testing the what: Many people are forced into freezing conditions or sweltering hot conditions to smoke so that they do not break rules or make an inside area smell like smoke.

·      Testing the why: Why should people have to smoke outside when they can smoke in the comfort of their own home or somewhere with air conditioning.

·      Interview #1

o   In this interview, I found that this male cigarette smoker is frustrated that he must stand out in the sun during summer in Florida to smoke a cigarette. He also says that he knows many people that are also frustrated. He also says that it would help if he could smoke at work without having to leave his desk because this wastes his time. He feels he could be more productive at work if he could just smoke without having to go outside to smoke.

·      Interview #2

o   In this interview, I spoke to a female smoker who says that she hates having to go out into the cold winter in New York to smoke. She says that her fingers get numb and it makes it a lot less enjoyable. She also said that she hates when her clothes and hair smell like smoke afterwards. She thinks that if this product was made it would have to encompass the smoke coming from the smokers mouth but also somehow take away the smell of the smoke coming from the object being smoked.

·      Interview #3

o   In this interview, I spoke to a non-smoker that works and lives with people who smoke. He says that even though it does not directly affect him this would be great for him because his roommates and co-workers always smell like smoke and it makes him feel nauseous. He says that this could help him avoid having to smell smoke coming from other people.

·      Interview #4

o   In this interview, I spoke to a mother of a smoker. This mother thought that the product was interesting but thought that it should not be made available. She thought this because she wants her son to quit smoking and thinks that this will just make it easier for him to smoke and that it will make quitting even harder for him.

·      Interview #5

o   The last person I talked to is an older man who has been smoking cigars for 20 years daily. He said that this system already partially exists inside of many cigar shops. In these shops, they have a filtration system that sucks up smoke, but it is not direct or strong enough to eliminate the odor. He thinks that a system like this would help many smokers to smoke more comfortably. He says it could especially help him because he is elderly and it is not as relaxing for him to smoke outside during very hot or cold times.

Given your interviews, what do you know about the opportunity that you didn’t know before?

·      Through these interviews, I learned that my product would have to be more complex then I originally thought. When I first formed this idea, I thought that just an apparatus to blow your exhaled smoke through would be good enough. This is not the case because there is still smoke coming from what you are smoking. My product would have to be a filtration system that encompasses the smokers whole head or sits in front of the smoker extremely close that has enough power to suck the smoke away.