Researching products a breeze for Bay firm

Product development company Locus Research is tucked away down a service lane in a cramped upstairs studio in downtown Mount Maunganui.
The reception area is filled with the latest mountain bikes, reflecting the pastime of staff members, as there's no room to store them out of sight downstairs.
The board room is cluttered with samples of new products. Every little space is taken up.
Amongst this so-called "chaos", a smooth-functioning team of talented designers is focused on turning bright ideas into successful retail products for clients.
Founded in 2002 by Timothy Allan, Locus Research has gained national and international prominence for its research and development. It also has a smaller digital office in Auckland.
"We will provide everything that is required to create an innovative product and take it to market - and it's based on accurate research," Mr Allan said.
Locus Research - it has six designers and a full-time administrator - manages the design, engineering, branding and marketing work, even down to organising intellectual property protection and compliance paperwork in the different markets.
It has built its own in-house, multi-skilled research and development (R&D) team that saves companies/customers money and time by not having to set up their own department. The service it offers is virtually unique in New Zealand and Australia.
"We can mock up a product through inter-active design, understand the price points, and have the distributor and retailer signed up before it is fully developed," said Mr Allan. "Often, it's a race to the finish line and you've got to be quick with the design."
It teamed up with Christchurch-based The Merino Company to gain international recognition by winning a global Medical Design Excellence award, announced this month in the US, for its wool-compression garments to treat chronic venous diseases.
The Encircle knee-high, snug-fitting inner and zip-up outer layers are knitted together with merino wool and polyester.
The compression therapy is the first to utilise the moisture-absorbent and medicinal properties of merino that improves circulation.
Locus Research also designed a locally developed wardrobe and storage system in homes, called getsorted, that enables the owner to mix and match drawers, cabinets and shelves.
Both new products, the bedroom furniture and Encircle garments, are being rolled out into the marketplace. The getsorted storage system is going into 200 Bunnings Warehouses in Australia and 25 in New Zealand. Already, the product has gone into 100 outlets in Australia, and takes up two bays in each Bunnings store.
The Encircle compression stockings, with up to six sizes, will be launched in Australia in July, and Melbourne-based Symbion Pharmacy Services will supply the product to 800 stores within 12 months.
The garments should be available in New Zealand this year, and distributors are also testing the product in Scandinavia and Britain. The Locus Research/The Merino Company team will also explore opportunities in the US on the back of their medical design award.
Locus Research helped develop a weatherboard exterior cladding system for Napier-based Pacific Wood Products, a surfboard travel system for Curve Surf in Auckland, heavy-duty polyester chainsaw protection trousers and flaps for Manukau-based Jaedon Enterprises, and anti-corrosive lanolin (wool grease) lubricants for Prolan, operating out of Omokoroa.
Mr Allan completed a Bachelor of Industrial Design at Victoria University in Wellington and first worked at Te Papa museum, creating natural history displays. He moved to Tauranga in 1997 and joined the research and development team at bed and furniture maker Design Mobel.
"David Macfarlane (the founder) valued design and sustainability, and he bought everything inhouse - research, graphic design, CAD/CAM and product developers," Mr Allan said.
He worked on Design Mobel's Sleep system which identified the best mattress and slat bed for a good night's rest.
Mr Allan then set up his own research and development business at the start of 2002, and was joined six months later by Blythe Reece-Jones, who is now one of three programme directors, alongside Rogier Simons and Jonathan Jones.
Mr Simons led the getsorted project, and Mr Reece-Jones managed the Encircle programme which involved AgResearch Textiles Group and the Medical Research Institute of New Zealand.
The Encircle compression therapy grew out of Locus Research's initiative, called Transform, to access $1.5 million of government R&D funding.
"We ended up having 60 developed proposals and trimmed it down to 15, then six and finally two," Mr Allan said.
The chainsaw "cowboy" chaps was one product, and Encircle the other. The Encircle garments which fit comfortably to the skin are an alternative to bandaging and compression hosiery.
Mr Allan said Locus Research works on four to five major programmes at a time and can take up to four years to commercially launch the product.
"Our success rate for market entry in the last five years has been 100 per cent." Locus Research has even developed its own manual that outlines all the steps a customer needs to take to get the new product over the line.
Mr Allan has his own five-year plan. He wants to double the number of staff, and build a more spacious design hub that has testing and photography facilities.
"We have a small office in Auckland, but we all like living here; it's a great place to bring up kids. We can have our purpose-built hub here that becomes a centre of excellence for product development.
"There are enough projects out there. We just have to get more companies believing that developing new products and services is a key part of their business plan," he said.