Rent Clothes at the Airport

Airlines are beginning to charge more for passengers' luggage, reflecting the rising fuel costs of transporting the extra weight. If you could rent appropriate outfits in your destination city when you arrive, you would save on the baggage expense, avoid the hassle of packing, and have the latest fashions accessible on demand.

Such a clothier could be located in or near the airport, perhaps alongside the rental car plaza, with changing rooms, tailors, and laundry equipment onsite. A customer might pay a deposit per outfit - business suits, athletic wear, international/culturally appropriate dress, etc - and get some of the deposit back upon returning them. The store could also have a website where you could browse options and pre-order them in your size to be waiting for your arrival.

Since every ounce counts during flight, airlines would likely partner with the venture, as it would have tremendous potential to conserve fuel and costs. Flying less weight around the country and world would also reduce the airline industry's enormous carbon footprint and help the environment.



CATEGORY: Travel / Business Idea
IDEATION: July 13, 2009

Rooftop Advertising

With the proliferation of GPS systems and satellite mapping on the Internet, there is suddenly a whole new face that a business can offer to potential customers: the aerial view. When getting directions from any map software, people would more easily recognize your business if it had a sign on the roof.

There is room in this market for franchises of rooftop advertisers - those who can perfect the design, printing, & installation of billboards and rooftop signs. The signs would have to be large, durable, and weather proof. They could even be functional - being light colored to reflect the sun and save energy! (Which would be for a warm climate... If you're in a cold climate, they could be dark to absorb energy.)

One could even hook this idea up with the folks that produce map software, such that there is a hyperlink on the latitude and longitude coordinates of your business which leads to your website.



CATEGORY: Internet / Marketing / Business Idea
IDEATION: July 17, 2008.

Record Collisions with Car Camera

More and more car makers are offering a reverse camera to improve visibility while backing up. It would be easy to add a small flash memory drive that continually records in a 10 or 20 minute loop. This would enable the recording of a car accident for insurance purposes or police documentation.

A camera shut-off could be triggered by the same sensors that deploy the airbags, or started manually with a button. This way, the memory drive would hold only the footage immediately before and after the collision or incident. The video could then be uploaded to a USB drive for the police or your insurance company.

With reverse cameras already in place, one can imagine the hardware and firmware would cost car manufacturers less than $30 to mass produce. This would be limited to viewing events behind the car, but the system could possibly be bolstered with a cheap forward facing camera, and perhaps a data stream from the dashboard with the current speedometer reading, compass direction, etc. This would perform a similar function to the ‘black box’ in airliners.

CATEGORY: Transportation
IDEATION: August 7, 2009, submitted by Jake Salter.

Phosphorescent Concrete

Embedding a phosphorescent additive or coating into the surface layer of concrete would increase visibility at night. This would be optimal for airplane runways, especially in remote areas with limited electricity.



CATEGORY: Transportation / Construction
IDEATION: 2001.