Lylo: A New Era of Eco-Friendly Laundry Innovation with Paramveer Bhachu & Joanna Power

Hello and welcome to this episode of Conscious Design. I'm your host, Ian Peterman, and author of the Conscious Design book. And today I'm really excited to have Joanna and Paramveer. They're the co-founders of Lilo, a portable washing machine created to reduce water use. Welcome to the show. It's good to have you guys.

Hi.

Great to be here.

Perfect. So what I'd like to do is jump a little bit back. And start with, how did you guys start? What got you guys to go, hey, we want to make a portable washing machine and, and save some water?

It was actually while I was at university and it was during COVID So we had a lot of spare time during lockdown. And I saw a really terrifying statistic about how much water young people waste, especially while at university, because they take quite long showers. And it was kind of sitting on my mind for ages and I was thinking there must be kind of a better way to use this water. Will it in quite a lot go to waste? And this was while I was kind of having a shower. I was thinking, oh, I've got to do my laundry. And in the UK, student accommodations are kind of a big laundry center that's sometimes quite far from where you live. So I was a little bit frustrated at that laundry system. And I was thinking, oh, maybe we could encourage people to reuse their shower water if it actually answered a solution such as laundry. And that's where kind of the idea sprung from. And I got in touch with Pav because he was also on my course and I absolutely loved his work. He did great design. And I said, like, at the moment I've got this really shoddy idea, you know, it's just a box. Will you work with me? And then it kind of springboarded from there.

Amazing. I love shower ideas. This is always, always good. Your product actually goes— you mentioned the features that you're able to put it— the tank, correct— into the shower so that you're collecting otherwise, otherwise just wastewater, really, and then be able to use that. You guys are in development, and I think you've started to get some feedback from people. Can you Talk a little bit about where you guys are at in that journey to fully commercializing it.

Oh yeah. And so it's been quite a long journey. And initially, because we did start in COVID, there was quite slow development because we couldn't get into the workshops. So it originally started with kind of building models to test the basic assumptions. So the first one was, can we fill a tank in a shower? Is that off-run system even going to work? And so we built a lot of prototypes testing that tank. We also did a lot of tests on whether people would even feel comfortable reusing their shower water. So we did kind of a lot of more like psychological-based tests, asking people about pictures of water that they could and couldn't see and what colours and things were in it and how they felt about that, to then set the standard for how well we had to filter the water. We spent a lot of time working on the filter and then the machine system was kind of after. And then since then we've been working with a consultancy to put it all together into a unit and have been interviewing a few students and boaters, getting their information on how much water they use and how it would fit in their lifestyle. So it's been quite, yeah, quite a long journey.

Yeah. And you mentioned, I think when we first connected, you mentioned there's actually quite a few applications for this and you just mentioned, right, boating, obviously students that are, you know, that makes perfect sense for making a dorm much better. What are you guys seeing, right, as all the applications that you're having in mind or you're thinking about for this kind of product?

Well, we had surprisingly quite a lot of people reach out to us over email and like social media channels and stuff, because when we initially came up with the idea, we we're purely thinking about the student market. And stuff like the boating market has kind of originated through people telling us that this would work very well on their boats, for example. The other kind of like potential uses for it as well could be camping or glamping, depending on, you know, what you want to go for there, as it doesn't require a fixed source of water. Kind of a big one we've also seen that people would be very interested in would be kind of services for developing countries. I think that's quite a big one. We'd love to get to a position where we can create a product that can go worldwide and help out people in a lot of different scenarios. But even, even sticking more around the UK, we've had interest from companies like Bupa, who are thinking about potentially getting into care homes and stuff like that. There's a lot of different applications really for this, this product.

That's a pretty broad range of uses. Now, in terms of like using the product, and talked a little bit about multiple water sources, because you have the filter in there, You're able to really take any kind of, obviously not extremely dirty water, but within a reasonable range of water and be able to use that as a source, correct?

Somewhat. So in the UK, we categorize water into 3 areas. There's black water, gray water, and white water. So white water is your drinking water, black water is your sewage. So the main difference is Bodily fluids between that last one, and then grey water, which would just be showers, sinks, and not quite sewage. So anything kind of in that area. For us though, the reason that we really target shower water is because it's such a large source. And because of the sulphate use in that water, the pH actually increases in the water and it ends up with a better wash quality. So we've actually selected a form of water that it's better to recycle from because of the use.

Oh, interesting. Okay. So shower water is actually a premium for this case is like a premium, a premium water to use because of the pH. Is it just the pH level then? Is that the kind of the magic sauce? I guess, I guess.

Pretty much. Yeah. It does really help them with the chemical reaction with the detergent. We haven't tested kind of how ideal, and we haven't really looked into other ranges. We've more just checked with that one, but it does help.

I'd never have guessed that that would be a better, better water to use. Now you're making me think about what you could do for like a regular washing machine, cuz it's pulling in a different pH. That's interesting. Learned something every time I, I talk to someone new. In terms of kind of the branding and how you guys are launching, what has been your approach? And I know you have people randomly coming in and going, hey, I could use it for this. What is your guys' focus right now in terms of how are you branding it? How are you marketing it? What's your launch looking like?

So I think kind of where we are at the moment, we are obviously still in the development phase of the product and we want to get out and test it. But in order to do that, we need to kind of arrange people that are willing to test it. So that's where obviously our kind of our social medias and the whole of the branding side of things really, really come in. We want to create a product that is enticing to use, that a lot of people, again, in different markets want to use and are kind of attracted to. We don't want to create a product that it might do good, but it might just look a bit weird. Like we want to kind of break down that barrier and then have this kind of really nice product that you want to bring into your home, you want to use. And that way you'll actually want to kind of save water and kind of get involved with the whole thing. Kind of working towards the future, we'd absolutely love to bring people on board. I think we've even kind of floated the idea of potentially doing a Kickstarter or a crowdfund kind of later down the line once we are later on in development, because especially again with the traction that we've had online, it's something that people could kind of get involved in back and kind of go forward with. And Kickstarter does kind of seem like a really cool place to do that. We can kind of foster an environment, have people joining in at an early phase and kind of seeing the development of the products before it goes out. And I think that's what we kind of want to foster and want to do really. Yeah, just create a community around the product. And so far, I think we're successful. We're not as successful as we could be yet because we have yet to kind of show off the final product. But I think we're well on our way to kind of having an enthusiast following.

Yeah, well, it sounds like what you shared and what I've seen too is that there's a pretty good response, right? If you're organically getting people going, hey, I could use this over here, I That's a great sign. Everybody, everybody wishes they had that. So I think it's a great thing. And kind of combining what you guys are both on the branding and, and in the design, something you mentioned, John, was the color selection and more of the psychology behind that. How has that played with your design and then obviously your branding? How has that research really impacted Where you ended up.

So the main thing in relation to the design of the product is we found that people were more cautious of water that you told them that you had filtered but weren't showing them than they were of water that was filtered and showed to them. So on the product, we made sure we have a few aspects like, like you see on a normal washing machine, like a window or partitions where you can see through and You know, in confidence that, that, that is filtered water. That seemed to help a lot. So in terms of the design, yeah, it was adding those little elements of kind of look-throughs.

That is interesting. So people, even if they saw the filter and they knew the filter was there, they still were more suspicious if they couldn't see the final water.

Yeah. We had people as well that were willing to drink ridiculously high pHs and hardness levels and really unsafe water before they were willing to drink filtered water in a cup they couldn't see.

Weird. Oh, interesting.

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I feel like this should turn into a whole study. I would drink filtered water. I grew up with that. It was like always drinking filtered water.

So yeah, they were all told as well, not just this is filtered, this is your shower water that has been filtered, which I think is where people get Okay, interesting.

So they knew it was shower water and they just psychologically, they couldn't handle that.

Yeah, they knew it was previously dirty water and it just, it was a no.

I think there's so many weird quirks about people. That is super interesting.

But it's amazing how much that influences the product design because if you move forward with a product then that doesn't allow them to view it, You kind of build that distrust in what it's doing. And that, especially for a product like ours where the biggest assumption is, you know, are people going to make that lifestyle change of using their shower water? Things like that are so vital to test early on.

Right.

And you're seeing, right, you're expecting your clothes to come out clean. So if you can't see at all, it's all just a mystery. It'd be very Yeah, I could see how you'd be concerned that it won't be clean at the end. Did the color selection too, did that, did that come down to a psychological level?

Or was—

did you have a little bit more freedom than having to put the window in?

The color as well has a big impact. So, I mean, at a base level, we want the product to be a physical manifestation of the brand. So whatever the product looks like, it represents the brand, and we want the two to go together in harmony. When it came down to actually kind of designing the product, and we obviously had this window, we found that making the ball that we have inside the machine, the— by tinting the ball blue, it kind of gave a blue hue to the water, which again made it look more— I don't want to use the word appetizing because that sounds like you're about to drink it, but— It makes it I don't know, psychologically it feels cleaner, it feels fresher, it feels like a swimming pool, it's bluer. And, and yeah, psychologically it makes you think it's just a lot cleaner and it's, it's magic basically. Yeah. Um, so that's like kind of how we kind of started with the color, the blue, which has obviously made its way into the company branding. But we've also tried to use that as well to kind of highlight touch points as well. So how best to do that? We try to highlight that with certain colors? If there are different types of washes, can we represent that through an extreme amount of color versus, you know, a normal amount of color, for example? And also textures and patterns as well. Lila has— like, Lila has its own kind of wave pattern, which is synonymous with the logo. And we've tried to incorporate that with the mat on the side of the machine. And that's not only a nice bit of branding, but it's also a functional kind of grippy surface that you can stand on. That is represented by both the color and the pattern, basically. So we've tried to kind of make both the brand and the product work together, but again, makes it very functional and understanding for the consumer as well.

I love that. Yeah, it's so important to blend those together. It's great. It's so funny that the blue— it makes sense though. The blue water makes it feel more safe, I guess. Probably a good descriptor of that. One of the things too, I think, I think we talked about, you guys are definitely looking for people to test, kind of what are you guys putting together just in case there's anybody listening that wants to be part of this? What are you guys trying to put together as far as, I guess we would call it a beta test with this?

Yeah. So we should be coming to the end of building our final unit by the start of next year. We really would like people to reach out to us on the Lilo Products website. So liloproducts.co.uk, where there's a contact at the bottom, because we're really looking for people that would be willing to, on their boat, in their house, however they feel they could use it well, take one of our kind of models and test it for a few weeks, and then just write us some feedback on how they found it fitted within their unique lifestyle, just so we can get an understanding of how it works in all of those markets.

Awesome. Yeah, I feel like there's so many boating and campers, right? Because there's a lot of You mentioned glamping, but there's also a lot of camping trailers and things like that that just don't have— I mean, none of them really have a washing machine in them, actually, that I can— well, maybe, I don't know if you've seen images of Will Smith's massive one, maybe that has a washing machine in it, but most people don't drop $20 million on an RV. That seems like a really great applications for you guys that you guys are finding. And you mentioned you started off as students as well. Is that, I guess, in your research, right? Because a lot of those, they have the washing machine, you know, the rooms full of washing machines. Have you gotten any interest at the school level of not having to take up a bunch of square footage in these old machines they have to maintain? Like, is there— How is that? I guess there's interest on the institutional level as well.

Yeah. So for large organizations, there's kind of a two-sided interest. So in the UK, Universities UK have pledged to reduce the CO2 footprint for their accommodations. So for them, the washing sector that uses a lot of water and energy is a really good target. So it helps them meet those targets, especially because we don't overheat that water, so we don't use too much energy.

Okay.

Something that's really interesting is to get hypoallergenic washes, you need to be hitting like 90 degrees, which is way higher than any washing machine goes. And most modern detergents work best between 20 and 30. So people putting on kind of 40, 50, 60 washes is an extremely high amount of energy considering that that detergent doesn't actually need it and doesn't work best at that. Interesting.

Okay.

That's an energy-saving tip if you're using your washing machine at home. But what that does for the universities is it allows them to save a lot of money that would go on utilities. So that seems to be their 2 pulls, is the eco and the utilities section. So we've had a few universities that have spoken to us that are interested. There's also one in the UK that has given us a quote for a trial. So something we want to do is with 15 of their students. in their accommodations, send out the machines, and exactly as we spoke about before, get that feedback.

Can I just quickly jump in?

Yeah.

Joanna's facts and figures, uh, they were degrees Celsius, by the way. I don't know what they are in Fahrenheit. I just, I know you have a lot of American listeners. So yeah, no, it's, uh, what are they? Sorry, Jo, they usually do like 90 degrees Celsius, wasn't it?

Yeah, that would be about 190. Because, okay, 212, I think.

It sounds even more dramatic in—

Yes, yes. Yeah, you switch to Fahrenheit, it'll sound even better. One question too. So obviously, and you're talking about the energy savings, the washing side, is there— have you guys looked at drying or how that incorporates into This process too.

This is something that so many students want. Students seem to really want the drying aspect, and it's definitely a whole other problem in the grand scheme of things that we'd really love to go in and tackle. But most of our focus is just on delivering kind of clean clothes with reused water, so there's not particularly a solution for that.

We've spoken about potentially implementing a a spin cycle or like just a heavy kind of final rinse or wring out of the clothes, basically, to try and deplete that water as much as possible. But at the moment, again, yeah, like Joe said, we don't, we haven't really focused on whether or not we're going to create a dryer of any kind. Yeah.

Got it. Well, you can always look at that. I think there's some like all-in-ones. I don't know how they do it, but make it more complicated.

Yeah, well, this is the really exciting thing with laundry is like, depending on where you live and how you wash your clothes, it can be so different for different markets.

Yes.

And so if we can just nail the kind of filtration of that water into a washing machine, it's so easy then to create larger washers or washers that suit other, or washer dryers from there. Um, but it's just trying to get that first product.

Oh yeah.

Yep.

This is, it's much smarter. Take a step, master that, and then go. You try to do too much at once, it's, it's expensive and failure is high. So no, that's awesome that you guys are so that, and so that you guys are really focused, filter it, get a wash to happen, test that out, get people's feedback, and then As you said, you know, maybe we'll see this in larger, you guys will make some larger versions that can handle like my family size of laundry rather than just a student university. Long-term, kind of just looking forward, what are your next kind of marks? I know you guys are obviously this beta test, getting it out, doing a test with the university. What other steps are you guys seeing right now before you can say, yes, we're ready to commercialize? And fully launch the product?

I think, like, as you've already said, we've got the testing out, working out all the kinks, being at a point where we can manufacture them just readily, as opposed to specific, like a one-off or like a batch scenario, kind of like a— well, to be honest, even still a batch, like a batch manufacturer, if we were set up for that, it'd be quite nice. But I think what would be kind of a big thing for us, big milestone, is kind of a business kind of reaching out to us. And we did touch on the consumer side earlier, where we were talking about kind of individual campers, individual students. But obviously we've had universities come to us and say, this is obviously a very interesting prospect, it'll help us reduce it. The idea of a university or a camping company or somebody like that willing to buy a whole load for a building, for example, even if it's just to help us run a test, or if it then is in the future turns into, you know, actually buying maybe the first batch of machines and housing them, that'd be honestly a huge milestone for us because it would show us that huge company actually kind of sees value in the product, it's very useful to them, and we're actually— we are making an impact, and it'll kind of give us the footing we need to take it further and to either start manufacturing a lot more to individual consumers or again make those little changes to add on a dryer, for example. Yeah. Awesome.

Before we wrap up, this has been super great. Love your product idea. I think it's— I'll be excited to watch you guys as you start to commercialize this. Where can people find you? What's the best way to reach out? And of course, anything else you guys want to add that maybe we missed, or you want to make sure is said about your guys's product and brand?

So you can find us on social media. We're on Instagram quite a lot where we post obviously our kind of our major milestones. So you can follow us there. I think that's where the majority of the community is. You can check out our website as well. Which is lilaproducts.co.uk. As Joanna said, so our Instagram is @lilaproducts, by the way. They're all connected. So if you find one, you'll find the other. That's the way we like it. There's a lot of content there that you can kind of chew through if you're really interested in the product. We have a blog that we write every so often that we have obviously our progress, but also some tips as well, and some cool things in the media that we think will interest you if you're into that kind of water-saving lifestyle. And we've also got a couple of videos that we've done out there as well. We have kind of initial Like kind of pitch video that we made that shows off the product, kind of just a bit more explanation about how it works and how we do what we do. There's also me in a bathrobe, so if you want to see that, that is definitely the place to check that video out. We've also recently did a toot our horn when we can toot it. We recently did a TED Talk. It was obviously it was about kind of thank you. It was about saving water without kind of having a dirty conscience basically, which is again what Lila is all about. Our motto is clean clothes, clean conscience, and it was just kind of about that topic and how we're trying to answer that through our. products. And again, if you're really interested in the topic and everything we've spoken about, then go on our website and check out that video because it'll definitely interest you, and you'll find other people there that are interested in the same topic as well. So yeah.

Amazing.

Amazing.

Well, and for everyone listening, all these links will be in the show notes, so it'll be easy to click on. Yeah, I really appreciate both of you taking some time out of your day to talk about your product. I'm excited to see grow and continue and wish you the best of luck with that. And it's a journey, but there is a— there is an end at some point.

Thank you very much. You'll have to give us your details and we'll send you one when, uh, when we start producing them.

Hey there, thanks for joining us for this episode. I hope that you're enjoying the content we're putting out. If you're looking for more ways to learn about this, to get involved, create your own consciously designed products, So there's a couple of ways that you can do that. First is our book Conscious Design, which you'll find a link to in the description of this episode. Please check that out. Go over quite a bit of information, what the process is, how I've applied it to product design, and some really great examples of companies out there that are doing really great work. Some of whom you have seen on this podcast. The other way is our course, 4 Weeks to Launch, where I peel back the curtain on how to develop a product start to finish in a way that can create positive impact rather than any negative ones. So please check that out. That is a great resource that will also be linked in the description as well. And see you in the next one.