The Focus
In India's cluttered pen market, Classmate™ needed a breakthrough via a mass appeal ball-pen design to serve as their new flag bearer, with the goal of doubling their market share.
Our challenge lay in creating distinct visual and functional differentiation at retail touchpoints while working within an extremely tight per unit production cost.
The design needed to cut through the low-involvement nature of the category, where brand loyalty was minimal, and purchase decisions were made in seconds.
The Design
The Elephant team created 'Loop™' - a design innovation featuring a customizable fidget element in the cap that transformed the basic writing instrument into an engaging personal accessory.
The solution used durable Thermoplastic Elastomer (TPE), striking the perfect balance between user experience and manufacturing feasibility.
We successfully elevated the product proposition beyond its intended segment, enabling a strategic repositioning with enhanced features and longer-lasting refills.
The Story
When Classmate™ approached Team Elephant, they presented us with what seemed like an impossible challenge: revolutionize the mass appeal ball pen segment while working within extremely tight production cost constraints. The Indian pen industry, characterized by intense fragmentation and low entry barriers, had conditioned consumers to view pens as purely functional items. For Classmate™, despite their strong presence in the gel pen segment, ball pens remained an untapped opportunity with much potential to be explored.
Our challenge was to break this pattern. The brief demanded innovation that would significantly enhance the brand's market share while ensuring commercial viability – a true ask for innovation on all fronts.
What connections do users form with their writing implements?
Our research revealed fascinating insights about how people interact with pens. We discovered that college students used them as tools for self-expression that helped establish their unique identity. Young professionals viewed their choice of pens as extensions of their professional image.
Our most valuable discovery was understanding how pens transcended their basic writing function. They served as personal accessories expressing identity, facilitated social connections through sharing, and consciously became stress-relief tools through fidgeting & play. This last insight would prove crucial in our design development.
The Loop-De-Loop Solution
The pen's simple construction - barrel, nose cone, cap, refill, gripper, and end plug - presented both limitations and opportunities. We saw potential in reimagining their relationships and interactions. The cap, traditionally just a protective element, emerged as our innovation focus point.
Drawing from our insights, we developed 'Loop™' - where the pen cap became an interactive element. The loop™ feature created immediate visual differentiation while offering fidget-worthy interaction. It also provided personalization opportunities.
Choosing The Write Material
After extensive testing, we chose Thermoplastic Elastomer (TPE) for the loop. This material provided the perfect balance of durability, flexibility and cost-effectiveness, ensuring the loop™ would maintain its integrity despite frequent manipulation. Our engineering team worked closely with Classmate™'s manufacturing unit to optimize the design for mass production, developing new quality control parameters and establishing production efficiency metrics.
Market Evolution and Impact
As the product development progressed, an opportunity to elevate the entire proposition was identified. The innovative design and enhanced user experience justified a strategic shift to the next category, allowing for higher-capacity refill and better material.
Our team’s solution proved that meaningful innovation can be about finding new meaning in existing interactions. Loop™ became a desirable personal accessory, a playful ally, stress reliever, and a means of self-expression - all while maintaining commercial viability and manufacturing feasibility.
Through this project, we established a new way of thinking about everyday objects and their role in users' lives. The success of this approach proves that with the right insight and execution, even basic products can be reimagined to create meaningful user connections.