5 things the fishkeeping industry needs to improve

[nabokovfan87]

Hey everyone,

I am, or was, a design engineer working on a variety of projects related to aerospace seating.   The cool thing about that job was that I was able to work with injection molded plastics, vacuum formed plastics, 3d printers, various metals, electronics, cushions, upholstery, prototyping, and a variety of other mediums.  One of my "pride and joy" projects came trying to model a solution to save a massive company project.  Needless to say, it worked, it was fulfilling, and it's the type of thing where as an engineer that is the feeling of making a difference, and that feeling is what makes the job worth the effort.  Whether you're making the production line's job easier, the customer's life easier, or your own life easier by improving design, you report to many different people for considerations and have to put all of those things together for a robust product.

So, with that in mind, I wanted to try to elaborate on a few things I think "the hobby" from an industry perspective can do better.  I will specifically order this list in a priority as well.

5.  Protect quality.
One of the issues with today's product designs is how easily things make their way from the manufacturing plant and end up being molded in a different color with poor quality control.  We all are familiar with the "nano air pump" and it was news to me that these are common in other parts of the world, offered in half a dozen different colors, and come from a plethora of different manufacturers.  Does it really matter if one is "made better" than the others?  Would anyone reliably know which design is best?  This is where you're stuck looking at forums, youtube videos, unboxings, comments, amazon reviews, and so many outside factors to try to find what is actually decent and will work for your particular situation.  Secondarily, this is why we also see so many projects where people have to fix, create, or 3d print things themselves.  Make sure your own brand has a quality standard, follows it, and make sure that the stores that sell your product are beholden to that standard.  One of the best examples of this issue is one I personally experienced with Fluval, the E-Series heaters.  It's a FANTASTIC product, but I have ordered it from a variety of stores and had a 50% failure rate due to package design.  Why?  Well, because of the way items were shipped is one reason, but ultimately the packaging itself does not protect the product from damage.  That is the epitome of a design failure.
4.  Think outside of the box
There are a lot of products we use every day that are so rigidly designed.  The choice of "better" is such a meaningless difference at times.  To the extent where color and sponge porosity could even be the defining difference in a design being useful or a complete failure.  Rehashes of 20-50 year old products means that you're putting band-aids over solutions and not forcing an honest design review process.  If the least you can do is change one characteristic to offer a "revolutionary product" for the hobby, I think we all can demonstrate that the design engineers and those controlling what designs get pushed into production can do better.  There is a lot of skilled, passionate hobbyists.  Ultimately I think that's a skill set some major companies need to really take advantage of.  Something like a certification testing center should be the highlight of a company like Fluval, eheim, Sera, Seachem, and so many others.  Yes, I know they run some tests, but I also see a lot of very poor design choices make their way to the customer.  I believe Cory has mentioned it on more than one occasion, regarding how some companies are simply behind the times and not making products for the modern hobby.  This is also why we do see such a divide between some products (and prices) for fresh vs. saltwater products.  Sometimes this difference makes sense, especially given material requirements for a saltwater product design, but I guarantee that there have been some great idea left in the design meeting room and never even sketched out onto the computer.  (example: you're doing a water change and your bucket is full of dirty water, you're on carpet or don't want to drip on the floor.  Where do you place the siphon without dropping it into the tank?)
3.  Be honest.
In the past few years there is a lot of things I have learned a very small amount of information about.  I think because we've all been home for a little while there are conversations we've had and items we've been able to research because the time to do so was there.  These are the types of things that companies should be doing to protect and improve their product designs.  If you're making a battery powered product, then you'd probably be very interested to see what the electric car world is working on.  If you're making a fish food product and a documentary comes out about shark (mercury) being used in pet food, then that is probably something you'd want to look into.  There are a lot of examples of this.  As an industry, for the sake of the customer I think we can do a lot better than labeling a food product with "protein of an ocean creature" as an ingredient.  And yes, that isn't made up, that is an actual term used on a product.

Secondly, I think we really do need to have product issues heard.  If a company is simply rehashing designs, ignoring customer issues, or not really wanting to face some difficult design meetings, then all you are doing is hurting your own product line.  One of the better examples of this is how some canister filters were "improved" through their various design iterations, but plastics are now thinner, alignment tabs break very easily, and that results in issues for the customer with product ease of use and reliability.  Is this a very easy thing to fix?  Yeah. It really is.  When you make a mistake, admit it, fix it, and do better.
2.  Listen to the customer
This is a big one.  Think about it. How many times have you purchased something and had an issue, only for it to exist years (or decades) later.  Why is it so difficult to get a product that works, doesn't break on a whim, and where you can feel confident it will work for your particular needs.  Need a hang on back filter? Well, make sure you get one size up.  Need a prefilter sponge? Well, make sure you get one that doesn't just have a hole through it or make your own.  Need a lid for an aquarium?  Well, you are better off making one yourself.  Need something that isn't allowed to be sold online?  Tough, even if you don't have a method to go support local hobbyist shops and buy the product as intended.  There are so many considerations for reasons why products can't be improved or available, but I want to make it clear how many hurdles customers face just trying to buy something simple.  So many things are designed in such a way to look good on the box, but in use there are very obvious flaws that are often ignored and never addressed.  A lot of time and money is spent on marketing as opposed to design, especially for this hobby.  Trust me, that is something that is a common disconnect and it's something most engineers deal with. 

Even if it's a simple fix, it's almost never responded to on an FAQ page, and guidance and information for the customer isn't there.  A fun example of this is a medication I was looking at, dosing is per 2 gallons.  Or another medication where the front of the box says "treats 100 gallons", but in practice you're dosing the medication 5x a week and it actually only works for 2 treatments in one 10 gallon tank.  And my personal favorite, trying to find a lid for my aqueon 29G aquarium that actually fits is actually impossible.  When I tried to contact the company, I can't actually provide them the photographs with dimensions or get a response back.  This is the norm, and it's actually really unacceptable.
1.  Do better and actually try to improve products
Let's say there is a product in work for a new design.  Maybe there is a real push for something bigger in scope.  The first question I would ask the designer is "what was this product based on?"  Meaning, is this the type of thing where it's designed from the beginning to be it's own design, are we trying to use the same container and redesign the internals, or is this simply a product where we are going back to putting a new sticker on the box and not much else has changed?  Time and time again there are things released as "new and innovative" that really aren't.  Some companies might have a great product design on offer, but something as simple as using a 30 year old material choice is causing major issues with manufacturing, quality, production, and shipping.  All of those choices fall down to the customer, and all of those issues are very likely to be ignored as demonstrated in the above request.  I think overall there are needs for certain products and design costs don't have to be extreme.  I think the customers are hungry for product improvements, mod kits, and other things.  There is a few hundred examples of this, various threads, posts like this, and I think the bottom-line of any company would be improved if they just tried..... wanted to do so.

Please feel free to post your own ideas, feedback, and thoughts on the topic.

Edited December 20, 2022 by nabokovfan87
Autocorrect

[TheSwissAquarist]

I would say that’s a pretty comprehensive list…what about ‘Ensuring aquatic wellbeing’ as point 6? I came across some planaria killer the other day and the package warned that it was toxic to shrimp. 🤦‍♂️

[Schuyler]

On 12/19/2022 at 4:37 PM, nabokovfan87 said:

Do better and actually try to improve products

I feel like the problem here is that most people who enter the hobby will just go to a big box store and get an all in one kit. Then the people who are willing to spend the time and/or money are willing to do the DIY mods.

[TheSwissAquarist]

On 12/20/2022 at 4:40 PM, Schuyler said:

I feel like the problem here is that most people who enter the hobby will just go to a big box store and get an all in one kit. Then the people who are willing to spend the time and/or money are willing to do the DIY mods.

I do agree with you, but the fact is that not many people can afford to spend a lot of $$$ on a fish tank. I, for one, have only ever bought kits because they’re already (normally) dialed in to work with the other components. That has worked relatively well for me, apart from one kit from Juwel which has a dud filter & heater.

[nabokovfan87]

On 12/20/2022 at 7:40 AM, Schuyler said:

I feel like the problem here is that most people who enter the hobby will just go to a big box store and get an all in one kit. Then the people who are willing to spend the time and/or money are willing to do the DIY mods.

That's where I struggle, and one of the points I missed on.  One of the things I wanted to mention, but forgot to add it when typing. "Why does any of that list matter?"

Make products better, the new hobbyists don't struggle as much, fish do better, and they actually enjoy the hobby.  YES, information is critical and having a new hobbyist understand what to do is a huge hurdle, but often people have good intentions and a terrible filter. Often people have the right mindset and don't understand how the food they were given caused bloat or other issues. Long term, systemically, if the issues are fixed you're looking at a much better feedback loop to help new hobbyists.

That's why I mentioned how testing should be a highlight of major companies. Show us the tests on the box. Use that for marketing. Have some basis of standard for reliability and actually test your product for reliability. The point being, make sure your testing is robust enough and shows defects, not designed in such a way to only show success and ignore reliability issues.