“Desperate to innovate”: Frank Green spent 10 years making its new drink bottle lid
Frank Green’s commitment to innovation is behind the brand’s latest invention for its reusable drink bottles, the Switch Lid.
Frank Green’s brightly coloured drink bottles have taken their category by storm in recent years, but the success hasn’t slowed down the brand’s investment in new product development. If anything, it has spurred it on.
This investment has helped drive the creation of the brand’s latest invention, the Switch Lid, which launches today.
Founder and owner Ben Young says innovation is part of Frank Green’s “DNA” and the concept for the Switch Lid has been “bubbling in the background for many years”.
“Everything we have learned over our 10-year journey has been poured into this product,” he tells SmartCompany.
The Switch Lid allows users to quickly alternate between sipping water through a straw and gulping water through an open mouthpiece, via a touch-free twisting mechanism.
The lid combines elements of Frank Green’s existing Flip Straw Lid and Grip Lid options for its drink bottles, which come in four sizes.
The lid’s all-in-one design is “based on how real users think, feel and behave when it comes to using a reusable bottle to hydrate”, adds Young.
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Hearing what your customers tell you
Young founded Frank Green back in 2014 and the brand has carved out a dominant position in the reusables market with its signature drink bottles, coffee cups, food storage and pet accessories.
A mainstay of social media, the brand’s brightly coloured products are loved by adults and teens alike, some of which have gone as far as to create their own ‘hacks’ for their so-called Frank Green ’emotional support’ drink bottles.
In the case of the viral car cup holder created by fans using PVC piping from Bunnings, the company ended up creating its own version.
It highlights the importance the brand places on listening to its customers, something which Young says the brand is passionate about.
“We always love responding to customer feedback and evolving our solutions based on this,” he says.
Young agrees it would be accurate to say that Frank Green is dedicated to innovating every aspect of reusable drink bottles, but says the brand’s mission is also “much more”.
“We want to innovate and make things easy for our customers. We want to tick every box,” he says, adding that the brand has expanded well beyond drink bottles too.
“Quite frankly, reusables traditionally didn’t look good, and you had to compromise on style and functionality. But we’ve solved all that.”
Frank Green has patented the Switch Lid, and choosing to go down that path is one of the ways the brand stands out in an increasingly crowded marketplace, says Young,
“That’s really hard to do these days; nobody else is really doing that,” he says of securing the patent.
Young maintains that the brand will “never stop innovating” to help customers stop using single-use plastic, and the opportunity to create innovative products is what gets the team “up in the morning”.
“We are proud to invest over 35,000 hours a year on product development,” he reveals.
“And we’ve learnt that our customers appreciate it.”
Not one to hold back, Young goes as far as to describe the Frank Green team as being “desperate to innovate”.
“It’s that desperation that keeps us motivated to do better. I see being desperate as a badge of honour,” he says.
For other brands seeking ways to use customer feedback to create better products, Young recommends implementing a formal program to ask their customers questions.
“And listen to the answers, 24/7,” he says.
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