eBay’s Korean auction and shopping site, Gmarket, invented a toaster look-alike that sterilises smartphones.
“People touch their smartphone average 150 times a day and 7,000 kinds of germs are found on it, which is 10 times more than that of a toilet.”
That statement by Korean creative agency, Innored, sits at the core of Gmarket’s new campaign. This statement sits at the core of the agency, “Technology inspires creativity.”
The new product, The Green Toaster, was created by British product design company, Kinneir Dufort. A Gmarket app activates the “toaster”, which then uses a UV lamp to clean the phone.
The new idea follows in the wake of other tech ideas that have been making the increasing use of smartphones abundantly useful for its brand campaigns. It recently provided the free Wi-Fi Bus service so people could enjoy their mobile shopping without worrying about data loss. And it provided free smartphone chargers at bus stations for users who had run down their batteries while shopping on their mobile devices.
These campaigns then triggered the question, “How clean is the smartphone that everyone touches and uses every day?”
So Gmarket and its agency, Innored, and Kinneir Dufort wanted to give people a fun experience that would clean their smartphones. The agency then realised that the best place to do this would be somewhere public – like in a café. A cafe location was also time-efficient. People could clean phones while waiting for their coffee to be made. Giving the smartphone steriliser a toaster shape made it fit into its environment.
The Green Toaster is activated by downloading the Gmarket app and opening The Green Toaster menu. Then users put a smartphone inside the machine and pull down the lever. The smartphone inside The Green Toaster is sterilised in minutes by the UV lamp.
