Idea 50: Trash, Trash and again Trash

Problem:

Trash – a problem that many cities know. Sometimes, the regular schedule of city cleaners is not congruent to the amount of trash that is produced by the citizens or that trash collectors can hold. The consequence: mountains of trash piling up. Especially in a city that lives of tourism this could be a tremendous setback.

Solution:

Citizens oftentimes care about their city and want to help sustain it. Thus, giving citizens a platform where they can contribute to the “cleaning” process, might offer great value. This platform could come in form of an App that allows people to indicate “mountains of trash” that were accumulated and do not fall into the regular cleaning schedule of the city. The city then could deploy certain cleaning trucks that take care of the problem in “real-time.”

 

Idea 31: Hairdresser unplugged

Problem:

Going to get your haircut is not only a troublesome experience for women, for men it is as well. Questions such as “how would you like it cut?” are already portraying obstacles that many solve by answering “shorter” – not helping anybody. However, the problem turns into a general one, once one moves to a different city, not knowing anyone. Now, most of the tools are gone for both sexes and the search for a competent hairdresser moves one from one bad haircut to another.

Solution:

Let it be Four Square, Pinterest, or Instagram – all of these social media have one thing in common; they are platforms to share opinions and interact in one way or another. And this is what a simple app could do to solve the hairdresser problem by letting clients rate the person who cut his/her hair, as well as the haircut place itself. May the best hairdresser win!

Idea 28: Fragrance Comp Tool 1.0

Problem:

Going into a fragrance store can be a daunting experience, due to the sheer varieties of different perfumes and colognes that are basically divided into mass-marketable and luxury products. So, as the game of finding the right fragrance turns into a balance act between what “smells” exist, what one likes, and what one can afford, the brain keeps firing messages of total frustration and pain into one´s nervous system, until one has to figure out how many different fragrances one can try before getting a headache. However, this is only step one! Step two takes place, when one actually has to buy a fragrance for someone else.

Solution:

Inventing a comparison tool that recommends a fragrance based on the fragrances one has already at home or that one knows another person has, might be a solution. The tool could be based on algorithms that “use” the actual smell (the words marketing uses to describe it) or the different ingredients of a fragrance (assuming that possibly fragrances with the same ingredients will smell more, or less, the same when using a certain scale to compare them). Later a price category could be added that would allow the user only to choose the fragrances that one can afford. On the other hand, if one would like to change one´s style, one could ask the tool to only recommend perfumes/colognes that are completely different to what one has at home. Recommendations by the tool could later be adjusted and improved by implementing users´feedback through maybe an open platform. Once the tool hits critical mass, fragrance producers might push to be actually part of it as in case their fragrance is not in the list, it will not be recommended.

Idea 7: Ultimate Shopping App

Problem:

Every week different supermarkets usually offer several discounts on different products. In addition, some supermarkets always offer some products cheaper than others. In times of economic difficulties being able to save 5 or 8€ on each shopping trip makes a big difference. However, knowing where what and what not to buy is a complicated business due to the variety of supermarkets/products and when understanding where one can get the best overall deal when talking about an entire shopping list and not only single products.

Solution:

Creating an app that allows one to enter one’s shopping list or search for single products with recommendations on where the get the best deals/the best overall deal based on publicly available prices and weekly discounts that will be used to compare products of different supermarkets with each other in a combined database. This database would need to be updated on a constant basis, which might be a problem, but as this app might also mean free “advertising” for the single supermarkets, a reason for why information regarding prices would be made freely available easily might exist.