We started in sports shoes and gradually built our knowledge and expertise to include the most common manufacturing techniques used in consumer hard goods.

Choosing the right tool for the job; so the saying goes.

The manufacturing process you chose is important. Here are a few concepts to think about.

• What material could it be made of?
  • What is the application of the product?
  • Is the external finish important?
  • Does the part have load requirements?
  • Will the weather affect the part?
• Is the design/shape able to be manufactured using standard processes?
  • Sometimes, Industrial Designers have only thought about the ideal way the product should look and function without giving proper consideration to how it will be manufactured. Or they might have designed it to be 3D printed to quickly make a prototype. 3D printing doesn’t have a lot of constraints so you can make parts that might not be possible using standard, high volume, manufacturing processes like Injection Molding. In this case, the part might have to be re-designed for injection molding.
• What, initial, quantities will you order?
  • Low volume versus medium-to-high-volume; it matters. If you are only going to make a few hundred pieces, you have several options. For example, if you have a rubber part, you can either open an injection mold (med-high cost) and make it out of TPR (A kind of rubber) and the part price will be cheaper. Or, you could open a compression mold (low to medium cost) and make the part out of rubber or silicon. Units costs are a are more expensive but you have saved on mold costs. Other possibilities include using a silicon mold or 3D printing the part.