About Our Users
User Needs
| User Needs | Importance of Needs |
| Clean | 5 |
| Cheap | 3 |
| Convenient | 4 |
| Frequent | 5 |
| Reliable | 4 |
| Long-Term | 2 |
| Safe | 5 |
Figure 1. User Needs Chart
Figure 1 graphically displays the presumed needs of the potential users of the finalized solution to our problem. Looking at the chart, one can come to the general conclusion that the solution to overflowing trashcans on campus needs to be safe, efficient, reliable, and most importantly, clean.
Stakeholders
| Stakeholders | Impact | Effect |
| Students | Positive | Won’t suffer from over-filled trashcans |
| Janitors | Negative | May lose portion of their workload resulting in less pay/hours |
| Garbageman | Neutral | Garbage output will be the same overall |
| OSU Finance | Positive | Cheaper to use drown compared to paying faculty to empty trashcans |
| Campus Area Commuters | Positive | Won’t suffer from over filled trashcans |
| Trashcan Companies | Positive | Trashcans will have to be standardized to fit drone design resulting in lowered production costs |
Figure 2. Current Stakeholders
Figure 2 shows the stakeholders in the market for our team’s potential solutions. The stakeholders that were defined are based upon the individuals who primarily interact with the over-flowing trashcan problem on campus. Students, campus faculty, and maintenance workers are generally the groups who will experience this problem first-hand.
Market Size
The market size for a potential solution will be the whole Ohio State campus, as the problem of overfilled trashcans and the garbage distributed around trashcans appears all over the campus. Therefore, the market size will be about 60,000 people that appear on campus daily. The secondary market should be other places that have large outdoor metropolitan areas and other large campuses which also have this situation.
Current Alternatives
| User Need | Trash Drone | Campus Maintenance | Student Volunteer | 3rd Party Company |
| Clean | ✓ | X | X | X |
| Cheap | X | ✓ | ✓ | X |
| Convenient | ✓ | X | X | ✓ |
| Regular | ✓ | ✓ | X | X |
| Reliable | ✓ | X | X | ✓ |
| Long-Term | ✓ | ✓ | X | ✓ |
| Safe | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Figure 3. Current Market Alternatives
The user needs are present once more in Figure 3, displaying the current alternatives in the market for our defined problem. The main groups that play a role in trash collection are shown and compared to the previously defined user needs. From the figure, one can draw the conclusion that student volunteers appear to be very ineffective at meeting users’ needs, while campus maintenance and 3rd party companies can do so relatively successfully.