Aquapaw Pet Bathing Tool
September, 2017
This project started a bit unconventionally in 2005…
While studying Industrial Design at Virginia Tech, my studio was challenged with designing a product that would solve a problem in the home. I routinely bathed my family’s large dog growing up and wanted to make pet bathing easier.
The concept showed some promise but needed further refinement so, in 2015, I took a more serious look at its potential as a real-world product.
Initial Concept Sketching
Concept Validation
A few different functional prototypes were created to test the effectiveness of the concept with friends and family.
Preliminary Results Were Promising
A focus group was organized with local pet owners and groomers to receive their feedback on the design and viability of the product.
Some of the important questions that needed to be answered:
Do you consider this type/style of bathing to be beneficial?
Is it comfortable and/or convenient to ‘wear’ a sprayer-scrubber on their hand while you bathe their pet?
Is it effective as grooming brush in addition to a sprayer?
Strap design? (two different options were available, single strap and dual-strap)
Size, fit, price?
Key takeaways:
The overall feedback was positive.
It needed to be easier to take on/off and adjust.
The spray strength should be as strong as possible.
Adapters needed to be included to connect to the shower and garden hose.
One of the bigger challenges was packaging the push-button valve in a small enough volume that wouldn’t impede the user’s dexterity while also making it as easy as possible to ‘click’ the flow of water on and off.
The final product is ambidextrous, one-size-fits-all, and comes with the adapters one would need to install the device in the shower or on the garden hose.
The production of the Aquapaw Pet Bathing Tool was financed through a Kickstarter crowd-funding campaign and the first pre-orders were successfully delivered in late 2017.
Aquapaw has since appeared on Shark Tank, grown to include a small line of pet bathing products, and is currently being sold internationally.
