Pretty in Pink? - Dell Goes For a Cool New Look

By Amy Rowell

Disclaimer: I might be female, but don’t try to sell me a pink phone, a pink iPod, or God forbid, a pink computer. But then, I’m not 16,  either. If I were, there’s a good chance my tastes might be very different. In fact, only recently, my friend’s daughter — who is a savvy consumer when it comes to electronic devices — specifically sought out the pink model of the digital camera she was interested in. Why? Because it was “cool.”

  The “cool” factor has turned out to be a whole lot more important to many executives as well these days, and for good reason. What’s “cool” is what sells — even when it comes to products that previously might have been valued for their technology or price-to-performance ratio alone.  That’s a key business lesson for companies that less than a decade ago would have scoffed at the idea of concerning themselves with the design appeal of their products much less the color.

  But Apple has changed all that. In fact, according to the recent Wall Street Journal article, “PC Makers Take a Stylish Turn to Tackle Apple,” computer manufacturers like Dell, HP, and Lenovo are eyeing Apple with a bit of envy these days. And why wouldn’t they? Apple, Inc. — now the darling of the computer and computing device sector — just seems to keep earning more and more market share. Credited with doing that largely as a result of its design-centric approach, Apple’s competitors are hoping to tap into some of the magic by changing course themselves and becoming more “designer-friendly.”

  The real question is, of course — will it work? Will giving buyers the option of selecting from a lineup of laptops in pink, blue, red, black,  green, white, yellow, or brown, for example, actually capture the attention of a new set of customers? Dell, long known for its utilitarian approach to the computer business, is betting on it. Indeed, after watching its share of the PC market slip in 2005, Dell not only moved away from the direct-sales model that had earned it such success and acclaim in its early days, but also began developing products that would appeal aesthetically as well as from a price-performance standpoint.

  It did this by hiring more industrial designers. In fact, as the Wall Street Journal reports, “By the beginning of 2006, Dell had 38 designers, up from six in 2001. It now has more than 90, and is still recruiting.” Among notable hires is Dell’s vice president of consumer design,  Ed Boyd, who previously held design jobs at Sony and Nike Inc., according to the article.

  The message here? It’s an old one. Design matters. Design tools — especially those that enable designers and engineers to work together to come up with winning designs early in the process — can really provide an advantage to manufacturers. In particular, conceptual design tools — long the domain of the industrial designer — are key to this process because they allow designers to experiment with ideas in a more “freeform” environment. Indeed, it is this highly unstructured, open-ended, “what-if” type of design environment that is essential to developing new and innovative products. 

  Just ask the designers at Apple. 

Amy Rowell is an editor and analyst in the high-tech/manufacturing sector, specializing in PLM, innovation, globalization, and product development. She has also recently signed on as DE’s editorial director and can be reached at [email protected].