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1. Need being addressed
With an increasingly busy lifestyle many working class Americans have difficulty
making the time commitment into starting a garden, one that will produce vegetables that they
can consume regularly. Having vegetables growing in the backyard will help influence a
healthier lifestyle by having easily accessible fruits and vegetables without having to leave the
house.
2. General Description of Solution
The solution is to create a Smart Garden that would be able to grow and maintain
vegetation and fruits in any household. Users would not need prior knowledge in gardening nor a
lot allocated time dedicated to gardening. In a society where everything is becoming fast paced,
people often do not have the time nor effort to grow their own food at home. The Smart Garden
would be able to provide these people with a solution in being able to grow what they want,
when they want with ease and efficiency. The Smart Garden will drastically reduce the time
commitment required for gardening, requiring minimal effort from the user.
The idea of the Smart Garden is that users would be able to simply purchase our product
along with the Keurig style seed pods, which would contain vital nutrients and ingredients
necessary for the produces’ growth. By simply putting these seed pods into the the Smart
Garden, our product would be able to grow and maintain the life of the produce. Users would not
need any prior knowledge on how to garden, but simply know how to use our Smartphone
application and the functions of the Smart Garden.
The Smart Garden utilizes a hydroponic system, the growing plants in sand, gravel, or
liquid, with added nutrients but without soil. The Smart Garden would also be connected via a
Smartphone application, which users would be able to use to see data and analytics of the
produce being grown and keep track of its progress.
Through our product, we propose that users would be able to have one green smoothie a
day, ultimately providing an alternative to purchasing smoothies at the local smoothie store and
also a source of fresh, green produce at your home. Users would not only be able to eat organic,
4. 3
The Design
The system is a hydroponic vertical modular garden that will be able to monitor the
nutrients and vitals of the plant and automatically adjust water and lighting conditions, ensuring
the plants get what they need. A hydroponic system on average recycles 85% of water, making it
the most waterefficient growing style. The basic model is the base and the top, the modular
design allows more growing domes to be added to increase growing quantity and each growing
dome has the capability of growing 12 plants. The electronic components such as the
microcontroller will be housed in a waterproof box with the sensors and nutrient dispensers
coming out from it. The middle tube houses 3 inner tubes, one for flow up, one for flow down,
and the last to house wires. The water pump, located in the water reservoir will pump water up
one of the inner tubes to the top then it will flow down to each module feeding all the plants.
Plant → Harvest
This system is going to be plug and play, we will have keurig style seed pods with a
variety of plants so that the user can pop it into the system and a few weeks later having a
consumable plant.
Integrated Mobile Application
The smart garden will feature smartphone connectivity so the user can monitor the vitals
of the plants and control different parameters if a more advanced user wanted more precise
control over the growing conditions. The application will also notify the user if any maintenance
is needed (i.e. adding nutrients/pH adjuster to the automatic feeder or adding water that was lost
due to evaporation). The app will also advise the user when to plant their seed pods so there will
be plants constantly being ready to harvest instead of harvesting them all at one time, this is
called harvest cycling. It will be able to track the growth of the plant and notify you when they
are ready to harvest.
A Juice A Day
With harvest cycling the user will on average be able to make at least one green juice
smoothie per day, with the capability of expansion with our modular design based on the user’s
needs.
5. 4
Juicing Cost comparison
Taking a look at the cost of juicing with produce sourced from a local supermarket vs.
sourced from the smart garden we see that in a year there will be savings of $1350.50, which is
more than double the price of the basic module, it will pay for itself within half a year.
Produce Cost at Local
Market
Cost with
Smart garden
Green Smoothie
w/ supplies from
Local Market
Green
Smoothie
with Smart
Garden
A juice
per day
for a year
cost
savings
Kale $1/cup $0.20 /cup
$5 / Serving
$1.30 /
Serving
$1350.50
Spanich $1/cup $0.20 /cup
Mint $2/cup $0.10 /cup
3. Market Research
For our customer discovery, the team visited local juice bars and interviewed both
customers and employees for insight into their eating and juicing needs as well as getting
feedback of the concept of our product. The team interviewed 41 people between the ages of 20
and 40, of those 80% juiced at home, 80% were more likely to choose organic over nonorganic
produce, and 100% of those who don’t garden at home do not because they don’t have the time
to commit to gardening. All interviewed said that this would be a useful and helpful product to
have. Previously we were considering implementing aquaponics (the use of live fish in a
reservoir as a fertilizer) but 72% did not like the idea of it. The vegetables that the majority said
they used on a weekly basis were spinach, kale, tomatoes, cucumbers, mint, lettuce, and cabbage.
We will first focus on these vegetables before expanding to a wider variety of veggies.
The total available market is approximately 5 billion dollars in the U.S, the serviceable
available market is 3.4 billion dollars. The team is looking to tap into the 1.3 billion serviceable
obtainable market which includes local juicing chains, local hydroponic stores, and people who
juice at home. Initially we believe we can hit .05% of this market if the education content
marketing and involvement in the local San Diego juicing community go as planned which
equates to 1665 units sold. We are assuming an average unit sold would be the base and top
6. 5
module with one add on module as well as 8 6pack seed pods. From 2004 to 2012 major chains
have experienced more than double sales in green juice, indicating a rising trend of juicing.
Competitors
The smart garden is a relatively new concept, no large company has released a product of
this sort, only startups. No smart garden product has been delivered to the customers at this
point, all are either on kickstarter or the backers are currently awaiting their product. There is a
decent amount of competition out there but they seem to be lacking key features that we, as a
team believe are important. The biggest problem with the existing designs are that a lot of them
are tabletop systems and most cannot grow more than 3 plants, making a constant supply of
produce impossible. Many designs aren’t hydroponic which are more efficient and allow easier
nutrient control. All systems are currently indoor products, we are aiming to initially do an
outdoor product until we get all the kinks worked out then we will have both indoor and outdoor
modules, reaching a bigger audience. We boast our modular design, we are hoping to be the most
productive smart garden out there. Our biggest competition is currently Grove, which just
launched their kickstarter campaign this month, they are the only other smart garden capable of
growing more than 3 plants and include an aquaponics system but is also by far the most
expensive product priced at $2700. We estimate our base system to retail at $250 with each add
on module costing $80, with the average price of other smart garden systems with less
functionality than our design being $400, we believe that this will be very attractive to
prospective customers.
The Links of Competitors/References on crowdfunding
Biopod
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2099003506/worldsfirstsmartmicrohabitat?ref=nav_searc
h
Smart Herb
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/mattiaslepp/smartherbgardenbyclickandgrow?ref=nav_
search
Edyn
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/edyn/edynwelcometotheconnectedgarden?ref=discover
y
CounterCrop
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/548754341/countercropthemodernwaytogrowyourow
nfood?ref=discovery
Niwa
8. 7
4. Cost Estimates
Product Material List Base
Items Price Items Price
Arduino Uno R3 $2.99 Air pump $4.99
Bluetooth Module $6.97 Water pump $5.99
Liquid PH014 Value
Sensor Module
$21.93 5M Ultraviolet UV
395405nm
$3.99
SD Card Module Slot
Socket Reader
$2.99 Raw Material $25.00
DS3231 AT24C32 Real
time clock module
$1.53 Plumbing, tubing, fitting $5.00
Total $81.38
Possible Retail Price $250.00
The raw material costs are estimated based on single unit manufacturing, and the team is
expecting to be able to lower up to 15% for the massive production of 5000 units.
Product Material List Addon Module
Items Price
DHT11 Temperature/Humidity Sensor $1.31
Waterproof DS18B20 Temp Sensor $2.89
5M Ultraviolet UV 395405nm $3.99
Raw Material $10.00
Plumbing, tubing, fitting $5.0
9. 8
Total $23.19
Possible Retail Price $80.00
Needed Startup Supplies
More hydroponic supplies (tubing, pumps, air stones, nutrients,etc…)
Solar Panels and Batteries
More arduino microcontrollers
Electrical components (resistors, solenoids valves, sensors)
Plants and seeds to test
Fabrication facility
5. Project Plan
Marketing Risks
Currently our biggest marketing risk is keeping our costs low, we believe if the price of
the product is too high it will be harder to be more accessible to a bigger audience. Another risk
is educating potential customers about exactly what our product does without confusing them.
Many people are unaware of the benefits of hydroponic gardening including faster harvesting
time, better fed plants, and water savings. We will have to create educational videos and images
explaining the benefits of this type of system as well as showing statistics of how much produce
can be produced and how much money can be saved. Being prevalent in the juicing scene is
extremely important, as it is our beachhead niche market. Having our product being used in
many local juice bars as well as being visible to the customers will expose the product to more of
the target audience to this product, we will have to create relationships with these business
owners and convince them how our product can benefit their juicing business and lower
production costs.
Technical Risks
The biggest technical risk we face is properly integrating the sensors with the automatic
nutrient and pH adjustment system through the arduino microcontroller. We are still currently
experimenting with nutrients to optimize plant growth. Another technical issue we are facing is
the communication with the smartphone application, creating an streamlined workflow
environment in which the user can control the conditions in which the plant is being grown. We
are also currently working on implementing harvest cycling and the best way to activate the seed
pods at different times so that there will continually be plants being ready to harvest. Our design
10. 9
is currently intended for a backyard, for development purposes we chose to do this until that
design has been perfected, then we can make slight design changes to modify it for indoor usage
because there are many more challenges to be addressed for an indoor system.
Milestones
January 2016 Recruiting more members, continue research and development, prototype
and iterate designs.
February 2016 Finish working prototype of base and top
MarchMay 2016 Put our prototype in several early adopters’ backyards and get their
feedback, making adjustments to the design as we discover more issues.
JuneSeptember Establish business relationships in the juicing scene, start creating
educational content and build website. Source a manufacturer.
January 2017 Launch on kickstarter
May 2017 Ship final product
Fully functioning prototype expense
Raw Materials: $300
Fabrication Costs: $200
Research and Development costs: $400
Total Estimated Cost: $900
Project Plan
Team 6 is planning to apply to the ProofofConcept pitch competition in UC San Diego
Basement startup incubator in 2016 winter quarter. Our team is highly selfmotivated in the
project, and allocate members’ schedule in order to continue developing until completion. We
have a diverse team of engineers with collective expertise in basic design and prototyping,
electrical circuit design, and arduino microcontroller integration. We are currently also working
with members of Roger’s Community Garden at UCSD with experience in hydroponic
gardening. We do plan on expanding our team to specifically add more programmers but if
others express and interest and can commit we will be happy to accept people who offer
something to the table.
6. Appendix
Donations / Sponsors
● Hydroponics Supplies (Local Hydroponics Stores/Companies, Nurseries)
