CASE STUDY 4
Five Tool Marketing – FUNKIRIDES™

Starting Point
It all began when Kern Egan, founder and president of Five Tool Marketing, a Dallas-based sports marketing consultancy, was looking to hit one out of the ballpark, with a new idea that would reward fans for enjoying America’s pastime.

Up until now, bobbleheads had been the craze, but they’re not interactive and end up gathering dust on the shelf. Mr. Egan was looking to create a new, fun and functional giveaway that could be enjoyed by kids and adults alike and that was sure to be a collectible.

Midway Point
From the initial concept to the final product… the goal of Point Innovation was to take FUNKIRIDES™ from a series of preliminary 2D pencil sketches to a 3D, fully functional, modifiable and enjoyable wind-up toy car. Consideration was also given on how to make it unique and identifiable per team and per player or mascot. In addition, it would have to be designed to function as an advertising vehicle as well, with enough area to place a sponsor logo on the car.

From Point A to Point B
Point Innovation’s designers were faced with the challenge of taking Kern Egan’s original vision, that would topple the bobblehead world, from the original sketches to the final product, but where to start?  One of the biggest design challenges was to figure out a way to interchange the heads that were no bigger than a pen cap, so that each team could have their own mascot or player represented in the car and also to keep costs down.

While Point Innovation’s design team are masters at this kind of 3D work, this particular project presented unique attributes, so they decided to collaborate with VanDuzen, Inc. This company was able to digitally sculpt the players, mascots and faces in 3D from provided 2D photos by using the Freeform® Modeling System and haptic device from SensAble Technologies.

The result is FUNKIRIDES™, a customizable, wind-up toy car that puts a team’s player or mascot in the driver’s seat. The flagship FUNKIRIDE is a baseball-themed car designed around a team’s helmet, which pops back when the car is released to race away, revealing the player or mascot behind the wheel. 

FUNKIRIDES™ is A Homerun!