Loaf-able Bread Cats

Loaf-able Bread Cats

The bread cat is a cute & fun fidget that’s great as a desk toy, pocket toy, and decorative trinket. A novel, fun & fast transformation mechanism lets it switch between cat mode and loaf mode in an instant!

Goals:

• Handling: I wanted to make something that could be understood by customers quickly, through advertising or through in-store ‘pickup’ interactions.
• Production: With this design I wanted to make the most of 3D printing in terms of detail, quality & production efficiency.
• Comfort: Toys that fit comfortably into pockets & bags have an inherent viral nature, as users are more likely to show the product to their friends and family. For it to work as a pocket toy, it needs to be robust, durable and comfortable.
• Appearance: Last, but certainly not least, the design needed to be cute & approachable.

Concept:

I started with a brief sketch- originally it was going to be similar to the pumpkin spider, with separately-printed parts that would be articulated independently. However, I gradually leaned towards a single step mechanism. This was a better fit for the bread cats, as the mechanism was fast and satisfying, without a risk of parts falling off and getting lost. The tradeoff was less poseability, but it can still sit, stand, lie flat or loaf, which covers 90% of what cats do anyway…

Refinement:

The refinement of the design had three major phases.

The first stage of was bringing the preliminary design up to quality standards, by ensuring the mechanism worked well & no parts would break. After testing breakage/abuse scenarios and strengthening the design, I could begin stage 2: iterating with my customers! Observing my designs ‘in the wild’ at markets & conventions offers a huge benefit, as that way I can see how all demographics perceive and handle the toy.

The second stage was iterating based on feedback- every week I’d make a few small changes, and every weekend I’d get to see how those changes were received by real people. This was essential for tuning materials, tolerances, handling and appearance- I found & eliminated every way the design could get ‘stuck’, improved the sculpt, and tested different materials. ABS, PLA and ASA were all tested- the final choice was wood fiber PLA, which brought a unique & premium finish, as well as being the most bread-like in appearance.

One thing I found interesting was tolerance tuning- snug-fit tolerances, my personal favourite, didn’t perform as well as looser tolerances. Despite feeling premium, tighter tolerances made some customers uneasy while trying the bread cats out due to fear of breakage. Thanks to this information I’ve gone with looser hinges- this results in more sales at markets/conventions, and ensures the bread cats will perform well in stores.

The final stage was production prep- tuning for batch printing. Woodfill is a very risky material for batch printing due to clogging & nozzle carbonization issues- the usual method is to increase the nozzle diameter, however this results in detail loss and a low-quality appearance, so instead I spent time researching & testing to develop a print profile that kept the nozzles free of carbonization while retaining the use of .4 nozzles. A major part of print tuning is waste reduction- four colour prints are notoriously wasteful. There are toolchanger machines that don’t need to purge, however the layer quality does suffer. To retain single-printhead quality without unnecessary waste, a variable infill system was set up to ensure it performs colour flushes inside the model, which strengthens the parts, creates a feeling of solid quality, and brings the material efficiency over 95%!

The design is print-in-place which ensures scalability- print time per unit is only 72 minutes, with each print taking only a minute or two to post-process and package.

Currently, the first batch is in production, with stock being made to sell to NZ stores wholesale and ship to fulfillment centres in the USA for online sales.

Reflection:

Economics: The current refined version of the bread cat now performs just as well as my flagship pumpkin spider thanks to the new cute expressions and great wood finish. Early versions of the bread cat netted 30-50% revenue relative to the spider, however now it’s nearly 1:1! This is likely also due to the present NZ economy, which favours smaller & more affordable products.

Future plans: This is a very economically solid design too- From testing at different price points, the product’s ideal price sits around $16, while printing costs are $0.80, resulting in an excellent margin at $8/unit wholesale with room for a keystone markup (unboxed)

I’ve received wholesale interest from local stores I’ve reached out to, and currently I’m producing a small batch of 1000 bread cats over the next month, readying initial stock for those stores & priming stock for fulfilment in the USA- Their small size makes them very efficient to ship in batches as well.

Other notes: An emergent property of the ease-of-handling is accessibility- transforming toys are usually off limits for people affected by amputation or motor disability, however the cat is very easy to transform one-handed. I’ve sold cats to two child therapists on separate occasions who let their patients use the cat as a comfort item/fidget while they talk, which does make me happy and brings a lot of meaning to my work :)