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The encyclopedia · Product & Design · Product decision · 2021

Unilever redesigned a deodorant so people with disabilities can use it.

Degree Inclusive, co-created with the disabled community, added a hook, magnetic cap and braille so a deodorant works one-handed or without sight.

Unilever (Degree) · Wunderman Thompson · SOUR Studio

the move

Standard deodorant packaging assumes two hands, good grip and full sight, which leaves many people out. Degree's team set out to make the regular product usable by someone with limited movement or vision.

Degree Inclusive is a hook-bottle that can hang and be opened one-handed, with a magnetic cap that clicks shut, a wide bottom grip needing little finger movement, a larger rollerball to cover more skin per swipe, and braille and embossed labels.

It was co-created with people who are blind or have upper-limb mobility difficulties. Unilever invited 200 consumers with a range of disabilities to trial the prototype, working with the Muscular Dystrophy Association, Open Style Lab and The Lighthouse Chicago, and the feedback shaped the final product.

why it works

  • Designing for the most limited user made the object work for everyone
  • Co-creating with the disabled community caught issues a designer would miss
  • Visual and aural cues (braille, magnetic click) serve the sense a user still has
  • A physical redesign is more durable than a message that promises inclusion
the payoffDesign for excluded usersclever

what transfers

The inclusive fix is not a different message but a different object; design for the hardest user and the product works for everyone.

what came after

Degree Inclusive won the only Cannes Lions Innovation Grand Prix of the 2020/21 festival, a Gold at The One Show and other design honours. Unilever staged a beta program and pointed to it as a template for inclusive packaging across its brands. More than 60 million people in the US live with a disability, which is the market the product was built to serve.

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