Houseboat Waste Disposal - Market Research

[neuton]

Hi all,

 

Was wondering if you could help me with some market research I'm doing. I'm working at a startup that's building a toilet with more efficient waste disposal processes, looking at houseboats in particular.
The information I'd need from people requires some background knowledge of who you are as an individual (name, age, time spent living on a houseboat etc.) to some more specific queries regarding how you find the whole waste management process - really getting into all the inconveniences.

If anyone would be interested in helping us out, please like this post, and we can message you to set up a 5 minute phone call at your convenience.

Finally, we want to assure everyone that we adhere strictly to GDPR guidelines and will never use your data in any way outside of the purposes of market research. If at any point, you'd like us to terminate the data you've given us, we'll do that, no questions asked.

And our LinkedIn, for anyone interested in finding out a little about our background - https://www.linkedin.com/company/neutonltd/.

[Tony Brooks]

18 minutes ago, neuton said:

Hi all,

 

Was wondering if you could help me with some market research I'm doing. I'm working at a startup that's building a toilet with more efficient waste disposal processes, looking at houseboats in particular.
The information I'd need from people requires some background knowledge of who you are as an individual (name, age, time spent living on a houseboat etc.) to some more specific queries regarding how you find the whole waste management process - really getting into all the inconveniences.

If anyone would be interested in helping us out, please like this post, and we can message you to set up a 5 minute phone call at your convenience.

Finally, we want to assure everyone that we adhere strictly to GDPR guidelines and will never use your data in any way outside of the purposes of market research. If at any point, you'd like us to terminate the data you've given us, we'll do that, no questions asked.

And our LinkedIn, for anyone interested in finding out a little about our background - https://www.linkedin.com/company/neutonltd/.

 

Without knowing anything about your solution there are some technical issues related to other boat systems that your solution may make worse or render your solution unacceptable.

 

Houseboats as you call them are often connected to the land based sewerage system so not much room for your solution there. Maybe you are talking about cruising boats that are used for long term living but even then any problems that type of user faces will be similar to holiday boats. Maybe you need to be clearer about your target market.

 

Few people live on actual house boats, many live on boats.

 

I can offer a lifetime of experience from pre the introduction of recirculating or fresh water flush pump out toilets so sea toilets or bucket and chuck it on hire fleets through hiring and then boat ownership with a variety of pump outs and modern bucket and chuck its. You can feel free to email me on Tony@tb-training.co.uk.

 

Please note that few will be willing to publish their contact details on this forum because of spam & fraud so you need a greater post count before they can contact you by private message. My email address already in the public domain.

 

Edited to add: you are likely to pee people off if you make them type a web link out and then find they need to be a member to access your page. There is a little chain symbol at the top of your  composing window that lets you embed  alive link that is just one click away.

Edited January 29, 2022 by Tony Brooks

[neuton]

22 minutes ago, Tony Brooks said:

 

Without knowing anything about your solution there are some technical issues related to other boat systems that your solution may make worse or render your solution unacceptable.

 

Houseboats as you call them are often connected to the land based sewerage system so not much room for your solution there. Maybe you are talking about cruising boats that are used for long term living but even then any problems that type of user faces will be similar to holiday boats. Maybe you need to be clearer about your target market.

 

Few people live on actual house boats, many live on boats.

 

I can offer a lifetime of experience from pre the introduction of recirculating or fresh water flush pump out toilets so sea toilets or bucket and chuck it on hire fleets through hiring and then boat ownership with a variety of pump outs and modern bucket and chuck its. You can feel free to email me on Tony@tb-training.co.uk.

 

Please note that few will be willing to publish their contact details on this forum because of spam & fraud so you need a greater post count before they can contact you by private message. My email address already in the public domain.

 

Edited to add: you are likely to pee people off if you make them type a web link out and then find they need to be a member to access your page. There is a little chain symbol at the top of your  composing window that lets you embed  alive link that is just one click away.

Thank you for the detailed response Tony! We appreciate it.

[Rob-M]

46 minutes ago, neuton said:

Hi all,

 

Was wondering if you could help me with some market research I'm doing. I'm working at a startup that's building a toilet with more efficient waste disposal processes, looking at houseboats in particular.
The information I'd need from people requires some background knowledge of who you are as an individual (name, age, time spent living on a houseboat etc.) to some more specific queries regarding how you find the whole waste management process - really getting into all the inconveniences.

If anyone would be interested in helping us out, please like this post, and we can message you to set up a 5 minute phone call at your convenience.

Finally, we want to assure everyone that we adhere strictly to GDPR guidelines and will never use your data in any way outside of the purposes of market research. If at any point, you'd like us to terminate the data you've given us, we'll do that, no questions asked.

And our LinkedIn, for anyone interested in finding out a little about our background - https://www.linkedin.com/company/neutonltd/.

Your LinkedIn page returns Page doesn't exist.

[pearley]

"If anyone would be interested in helping us out, please like this post, and we can message you to set up a 5 minute phone call at your convenience."

 

Sounds as if you need to be sitting on the loo to participate.

 

[alias]

11 minutes ago, Rob-M said:

Your LinkedIn page returns Page doesn't exist.

 

I see it.  There isn't much detail there as yet, but mention of the generation of electricity from waste processing.

 

[Rob-M]

12 minutes ago, alias said:

 

I see it.  There isn't much detail there as yet, but mention of the generation of electricity from waste processing.

 

I'm seeing it now, don't know why it was failing earlier.

[enigmatic]

Happy to chat, but I can share some of my thoughts publicly anyway. You'll also find plenty of historic discussions of toilets on here with the search functionality. Boaters love arguing about toilets

 

I have one of these https://www.thetford-europe.com/gb/products/toilets/portable-toilets/porta-potti-365

Most boaters have something like this, or one of the more upmarket ones. More upmarket ones look a bit more like a normal WC, and sometimes even have china bowls, but the basic problems are the same

 

- Everything that comes out of my body ends up in a 20L tank, along with everything I flush/deodorise it with

- Every time that tank gets full (which doesn't take very long) I have to take that tank and tip it down a dedicated hole called an Elsan point. It's quite a smelly job, you have to be careful of splashback and dirty facilities, and usually it involves a boat trip to get there. 20L of liquid is heavy to lift off a boat too,

- The tanks have seals which need replacing and sometimes leak. I guess the cheaper ones have potential issues when dropped too.

- They smell bad, although not too bad with chemicals

 

The plastic versions look and feel cheap, nasty and too low to sit on and are a right pain to clean too, especially since bleach is discouraged as it's supposed to damage the seals

 

On the plus side, I don't have to pay for it to be emptied like the second most popular option (pump out toilets) and its less of a faff to use than the separating composting toilets.

 

[PD1964]

You say houseboat, then say you have the cheapest Porta Potti. When you say houseboats are you meaning the big rectangle floating homes that are mainly Marina based that don’t move anywhere and are basically static caravans on the water or talking about a Narrowboat or boat that people live on?

  Your explination above indicates that your a livaboard and want to design a new type of toilet?

Is that basically it?

 

Edited January 29, 2022 by PD1964

[matty40s]

9 minutes ago, PD1964 said:

You say houseboat, then say you have the cheapest Porta Potti. When you say houseboats are you meaning the big rectangle floating homes that are mainly Marina based that don’t move anywhere and are basically static caravans on the water or talking about a Narrowboat or boat that people live on?

  Your explination above indicates that your a livaboard and want to design a new type of toilet?

Is that basically it?

 

I'm not sure enigmatic and the OP  "neuton" are the same person.... 

Calm down!!

[PD1964]

52 minutes ago, matty40s said:

I'm not sure enigmatic and the OP  "neuton" are the same person.... 

Calm down!!

I’m calm, yes sorry @enigmatic  thought they were linked to the OP.

  I’d be interested on the company’s thoughts and ideas on the solution, or are they waiting for everyone on here to give him ideas and possible solutions, then cherry pick to develop a new type of toilet?

  There’s so many toilets to chose from on the market or has he ideas for a complete new solution to a problem that has had hundreds of pages already discussed on here?

  I see the OP is only Market research for the company.

Edited January 29, 2022 by PD1964

[enigmatic]

I'm not actually looking for anything, I was replying to a post to tell the chap doing market research into boaters' toilet problems what a typical boaters' problems with a cassette toilet were. On account of me having a boat, not planning on developing a new type of toilet (I did consider buying a C263 once) but being willing to help people who don't have a boat but do apparently have an idea for a toilet!

 

OK weve cleared that up now, I missed your post when I was replying

 

Not sure how a toilet would generate electricity like it suggests on their LinkedIn page (wind turbine for farts?) but maybe the original poster has some ideas for that

Edited January 29, 2022 by enigmatic

[PD1964]

2 minutes ago, enigmatic said:

I'm not actually looking for anything, I was replying to a post to tell the chap doing market research into boaters' toilet problems what a typical boaters' problems with a cassette toilet were. On account of me having a boat, not planning on developing a new type of toilet (I did consider buying a C263 once) but being willing to help people who don't have a boat but do apparently have an idea for a toilet!

 

Not sure how a toilet would generate electricity (wind turbine for farts?) but maybe the original poster has some ideas for that

I got you mixed up with the original poster, so the post was aimed at the OP not yourself. I too would like to know the company’s ideas or maybe the OP’s, or maybe put some issues they’re concerned with on here, or as I said are they after ideas and will Cherry pick people’s ideas to build into their system, saving time and money on R&D?????

[enigmatic]

I saw your post after I'd replied, and edited

[Bod]

Certianly to produce electricity in meaningful quantities from a domestic loo, at houseboat/narrowboat scale would be quite a feat.

Something that worked from an Elsan point scale, could be interesting.

 

Bod

[ditchcrawler]

LooWatt's waterless toilet system turns waste into electricity and fertiliser (dezeen.com)

[enigmatic]

I guess the promise of green electricity is how you'd get CRT to provide composting toilet waste disposal services...

[PD1964]

6 minutes ago, enigmatic said:

I guess the promise of green electricity is how you'd get CRT to provide composting toilet waste disposal services...

I’m still trying to find a link to the company to see what they actually do.

Anyone got a link that works as can’t get the one on the OP’s post to work???

Edited January 29, 2022 by PD1964

[system 4-50]

Does it also turn toilet waste into gold?

[Tony Brooks]

10 hours ago, system 4-50 said:

Does it also turn toilet waste into gold?

 

No - Bitcoins.

[Jen-in-Wellies]

26 minutes ago, Tony Brooks said:

 

No - Bitcoins.

Bitcoins are old hat. The new snake oil is Non Fungible Tokens.

The toilet generates an NFT for each use, proving the ownership of the movement. It can then be sold for profit, or kept in a bucket on the boat as an ever increasingly valuable asset.

[system 4-50]

10 hours ago, system 4-50 said:

Does it also turn toilet waste into gold?

This is not a silly question.  If your marketing is very, very, good, then it can turn waste into gold despite the laws of Physics.  Look at the success of marketing absolutely nothing into "Heaven", a state more valuable than gold!

[neuton]

1 hour ago, Jen-in-Wellies said:

Bitcoins are old hat. The new snake oil is Non Fungible Tokens.

The toilet generates an NFT for each use, proving the ownership of the movement. It can then be sold for profit, or kept in a bucket on the boat as an ever increasingly valuable asset.

Unfortunately as far as I'm aware there are no such plans at the moment for the toilet to have any relevance to the blockchain - but maybe in the future! You never know. 

[Alan de Enfield]

20 minutes ago, neuton said:

Unfortunately as far as I'm aware there are no such plans at the moment for the toilet to have any relevance to the blockchain - but maybe in the future! You never know. 

 

We used to have a toilet with an 'un-block chain'. Simply pull the chain and everything went away.

 

 

[PCSB]

2 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

 

We used to have a toilet with an 'un-block chain'. Simply pull the chain and everything went away.

 

 

 

You could have cleaned it before photographing it