Culligan with ZeroWater technology pitcher & Dispenser Line
Culligan International is a global leader in water treatment and water management systems with products and services that span across residential, workplace, and office markets. Culligan’s products include filtration systems, water coolers, ice and water dispensers, softeners, sparkling water dispensers, coffee machines, and deionizing systems.
Culligan laid out plans to leverage the recently acquired ZeroWater brand with a new line of filtering water pitchers and dispensers for the consumer market. Ammunition Group was retained to assist with the industrial design of the new line. Once the design direction was set, Design Integrity, a proven product development consulting company in Chicago, was hired to assist with the design to manufacturing processes (from tooling to quality assurance) for the new line.
Challenge
Culligan has historically sold their products through their national network of installers and service technicians at their company-owned and franchised dealerships. Recently, Culligan decided to start competing more directly in consumer markets.
Building on its 2020 acquisition of the water filter maker ZeroWater, Culligan set plans to develop a new line of filtering pitchers and dispensers that would compete in consumer retail channels with the top brands in the category. The new line would work with a next-gen ZeroWater filter cartridge, and it would include multiple filtering pitchers and dispensers with varying capacities along with an embedded meter to measure the total dissolved solids (TDS) in the filtered water.
Culligan ZeroWater filters are certified to reduce all major harmful contaminants found in water-PFAS, lead, pharmaceuticals, pesticides, and others. Additionally, ZeroWater technology removes virtually all TDS from water via deionization, which results in a level of filtration comparable to reverse osmosis and distillation. TDS is a measure of all the substances present in water, including everything from contaminants to minerals and other compounds. Measuring TDS helps to determine if the filtered water is free of anything that could affect its taste, odor, and appearance.
In addition to the use of ZeroWater filter cartridges, the new line would be designed with an emphasis on consumer-centricity and accessibility to create disruption in the water filter market dominated for over a decade by Brita.
Conceptual Design
In the conceptual design phase, the Ammunition team reimagined the everyday
water pitcher as an object that could live naturally in the kitchen, tucking easily
into refrigerator doors through a rounded-square form inspired by the simplicity of a milk carton. Beyond aesthetics, accessibility was a central driver: the pitchers and dispensers were designed to be approachable in every sense — not only affordable, but also effortless to lift, pour, and use — creating a product experience that welcomes all consumers with:
- An ergonomic handle on the pitchers for a more comfortable, stable grip
- A sliding lid to simplify the refilling process
- A fully sealed top to prevent spills while pouring from the pitchers
- A no-drip spout for a steady, clean, precise pour
- Built-in TDS meter storage so customers always know their water quality with an indicator light to notify customers when to change their filter
- Space-saving designs that fit properly in refrigerators
For the Culligan ZeroWater Technology filter cartridges, the goals were to reduce 5X more contaminants than the leading filter and remove 99.9% of total dissolved solids and the highest percentages of lead, PFAS (forever chemicals), pesticides, heavy metals, pharmaceuticals, and over a dozen additional harmful contaminants.
Engineering Design
Our engineering team was tasked with developing the designs of the new pitchers, dispensers, and filter cartridge for high-volume injection molding at high quality levels. Best practices were utilized for the design of the plastic parts, though some of the components required creative thinking and bending of the guidelines to ensure the consumer experience remained top priority.
For example, the connection between the pitcher handle and the pitcher body had to be strengthened with a local increase to the wall thickness on the pitcher body and an innovative attachment method for the handle. Several of the key design details required collaboration between our team at Design Integrity and key team members at Culligan, ZeroWater, and Ammunition to ensure proper function and manufacturing without compromises to the industrial design intent.
Multiple rounds of prototypes were fabricated, inspected and tested during the engineering design phase to ensure that the designs met all functional goals. In parallel, finer design details had to be studied and analyzed at length to ensure that the parts could be tooled up, molded properly in production, and fabricated with tight tolerances, low warpage due to the size of the flat side walls, and secure water seals between mating parts.
Once the preproduction 3D design documentation package was completed, the designs were reviewed in detail with the key team members at the selected tooling shop and injection molding facility. Final design refinements were then implemented, and the tooling release documentation package was completed.
Preproduction Support
Our team supported the project on an as-needed basis from tooling release through tool design, tooling fabrication, first article reviews (the first round of samples molded from the new tooling), second article reviews (second round of samples made from each tool), preproduction product testing, and all final engineering issues that arose until the first production runs were approved.
By putting our heads together with key players at Culligan, ZeroWater, and Ammunition, the combined team was able to work through the final challenges and decisions and get the new pitchers, dispensers, and Culligan with ZeroWater Technology product line to market successfully in a rapid timeframe.
Market Success
The new line of filtering pitchers and dispensers is now available through various consumer retail outlets including Walmart, Target, Home Depot, Amazon.com, and shop.Culligan.com.
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