Blue Marble Project

This article was originally posted at our sister site: the School blog

This post is part of a series - if you haven’t already, read part 1 and part 2 first.

After the huge PR response to our launch of the Whirlpool 3D model collection in September ‘06, the question was what to do next?  Major trade shows are an excellent time to launch products and the International Builder Show is the biggest for product manufacturers.  But I didn’t think home builders were quite ready for SketchUp and Google 3D Warehouse.
Google told me their first big show of 2007 would be Macworld.  They claim to like this show because SketchUp is the only 3D modeling software that works on a Mac, so no competitors show up.  I think the attraction is the Buena Vista Café, birthplace of Irish Coffee in America.  The Google folks were there several nights, just to soak up the history I’m sure.
At about this time I was thinking about video podcasting, convinced that Whirlpool’s online continuing education program needed a rich media approach as a competitive differentiator to the PowerPoint presentations that are the industry standard.  But I didn’t know enough about the technology and the players to get started.  Since MacWorld had several presenters speaking on this topic, it seemed like the place to be.

So my team hunkered down (easy to do in Michigan in December) and focused on creating the KitchenAid brand 3D model collection.  By January we had virtual appliances ready for Macworld.  Certain that an appliance manufacturer had never attended Macworld and feeling intimidated about “talking tech”, I decided to bring my son, Duncan, a photographer and avid Mac user, to translate.  Good thing I did.  Speaking the lexicon at Macworld is an immersion experience… like asking for directions in a foreign country.

The upshot?  We launched a virtual collection of KitchenAid appliances in the Google SketchUp booth at Macworld, the press picked up the PR story and I learned a great deal about video podcasting.  Maybe some learnings for reaching builders too, but that’s for next time.

This article was originally posted at our sister site: the School blog

Welcome to a new series, GreenSketchUpGuide, here in the School blog.  I’m an architect and marketer in the building products industry, have been working closely with Google and School for over two years and have ideas about SketchUp and sustainable design to share with you.  My blog site, GreenDesignGuide.com, covers a broad range of topics for the residential design + building community but this series, GreenSketchUpGuide, will focus on particulars.  For example, why is SketchUp so valuable to designers and the companies trying to communicate with them about sustainable building products and processes?

Let’s turn to a case study that’s been incredibly successful.  In May of 2006, the cofounder of SketchUp software stopped by the Whirlpool Corporation booth at the AIA Architects National Convention.  Google had just purchased SketchUp and they were exploring some big ideas.  He shared their vision for creating an online repository of 3D building products in the Google 3D Warehouse that could be accessed by architects and designers who want to design with specific branded products they can trust.  What’s more, the 3D models would be free to download, easily imported into SketchUp and available for any designer using a CAD program that recognizes the .skp file format.  That’s a big vision and it took a few months to get my head around it.

But we quickly started drawing 3D appliance models in SketchUp to meet Google’s fall launch deadline.  As it turned out only Whirlpool and Marvin Windows met the deadline.  But the online press coverage we received was sensational.  Appliance websites, CAD websites and even financial websites picked up the story.  One industry observer put it this way, “Maybe IKEA, but I never expected a company like Whirlpool to be the first to collaborate with Google in creating 3D visualization solutions for architects and designers.”  I knew we were on to something, I just didn’t know how big it would become.

I visit architecture and design firms often and learned quickly how widely SketchUp was being adopted by the design community… once I started asking the right questions.  Usually I meet with principals and partners of top design firms, established professionals about my age. When I asked them about SketchUp, they pointed to younger designers and recent college grads that introduced SketchUp to their firms.  The principals immediately saw the productivity gains in their design process, the benefits to their business and were on board.

It’s been exciting to see “next gen” architects having this much impact on established design firms.  However, nobody at the time seemed to know about the building product collections in Google 3D Warehouse.  Don’t they have time to keep up with appliance industry press releases?  I mentioned this challenge to my friends at Google and that’s when they introduced me to School!

Sorry, I’m out of words.  Come back next week for more of this exciting case study (Update: Read part 2 of this case study here).

Blue Marble Project has been invited to conduct technology demonstrations for those in attendance at IBS 2009. Blue Marble Staff will be on hand during the IBS Show at a number of events and locations to educate attendees and answer questions about CAD Software applications. BMP Execs are scheduled to deliver 4 presentations each day at the Whirlpool Digital Green Theater (#C5843). IBS 2009 is taking place in Las Vegas, NV from Jan 19-23, 2008.

The Blue Marble Project has been asked by Whirlpool, Velux, and the PATH House Committee to conduct technology demonstrations to thousands of builders and show attendees. Blue Marble Staff will be on hand during the IBS Show at a number of events and locations to educate attendees and answer questions about CAD Software applications. IBS is taking place in Orlando, FL from Feb 13th through the 16th, 2008.

From the article: “Blue Marble creates models for customers such as Whirlpool (NYSE: WHR) that want to encourage designers to use their products in conceptual drawings—a way of subtly marketing products to prospective buyers.”

We are thankful to have been invited to this year’s West Coast Green Conference and Expo which will be held in San Francisco, CA between Sept 20-22 at the Bill Graham Civic Center Auditorium. BMP staff will be in attendance giving demonstrations at the Whirlpool booth down on the main show floor presenting a series of demonstrations about using SketchUp for Kitchen Design. We’ll also be at the Google Workshop located on the 3rd floor of the conference center to demonstrate the process of creating and uploading models to the Google 3D Warehouse - a great way to let people find out about your company’s green products.