A unique feature of Pittsburgh is its proximity to local agricultural areas. This offers an opportunity to increase inner-city consumers' access to local produce at their grocery stores. OneBox helps connect Pittsburgh's urban consumers to rural farmers in order to build a better sustainable community.

OneBox is a container designed to eliminate packaging waste during the entire procedure of harvesting, processing, and transporting produce from local farms to local grocery stores.

OneBox was designed for and submitted to the CHI (Computer Human Interaction) 2009 Conference student design competition.

Designed in collaboration with Zoe Bridges and Beverly Hsu.

Through interviews, local grocery store managers admitted that they are most concerned with packaging because of their limited storage space and damaged produce because of sales. Farmers expressed concern with waste and operation expenses because they are held responsible for absorbing final production costs.

OneBox is a container designed to eliminate packaging waste during the entire procedure of harvesting, processing, and transporting produce from local farms to local grocery stores. Produce is placed directly into OneBox in the fields, then run through the cleaning machine while still in the container, which also gets washed along with the produce. Next, the OneBoxes are stacked together on a pallet, shipped to the grocery store, and rotated onto the display. Empty containers nest together and are easily stored at the grocery store until the next shipment of produce is exchanged.

OneBox reduces packaging waste on farms, saving local farmers thousands of dollars a year. Produce is not transferred into many different containers, resulting in less damaging and bruising. This benefits both grocery store managers and customers.

gregorysiegal@gmail.com