r/product_design

Hi all,

I'm not an injection molder but have worked a fair bit on plastic component development over the last few years. We've always opened steel tools even for low-volume parts and even prototypes. It strikes me as very wasteful if the tool isn't being used to produce hundreds of thousands or millions of parts, and so I wanted to hear the community's thoughts about typical prototyping workflows.

I'm aware tools can be made in aluminium or even high-temp plastic, but for some reason our molding partner has always been reluctant to do this. Any thoughts as to why?

Something that may complicate it slightly is that we're looking to make overmolded or 2K molded parts which combine soft TPU with a rigid polymer component, and we're targeting a strong chemical bond (the parts will be used to seal a pressurised vessel, so the bond must be airtight even at pressure).

Any advice on how best to prototype this kind of part in a cost-effective way is much appreciated!

Hey all

I’m a junior designer and I've been getting some traffic to my landing page (around 63 unique visitors in the last month, mostly from Instagram) but zero waitlist signups. Average session is 3+ minutes so I guess people are reading, but something's stopping them from converting.

Context: Gatherly is a social event planning app for adults who want to actually see their friends in person, not another algorithmic feed.

Landing page: https://miseenplacedesign.framer.website/gatherlybeta

Honest question: what's stopping you from signing up? Is it the copy, the design, the value prop, the trust signals, the form itself? Brutal feedback welcome!
I'd rather hear it now than keep wondering.

When I switched careers from psychology to product design, I was almost embarrassed that I had a master’s in psychology instead of a design degree.

That feeling disappeared pretty quickly.

Because I noticed something most design education barely talks about:

There is no good design without understanding people.

Design is applied psychology.

This free book is not just about the psychological mechanisms that shape user behavior, but also about what happens inside the minds of designers, teams, and organizations.

Defensive about your design decisions?
That’s cognitive dissonance.

You ship what your boss likes most?
That’s authority bias.

Designs get worse after team meetings?
That’s groupthink.

Users hate your redesign even though it’s objectively better?
That’s loss aversion.

I wrote this for people who want to better understand the mind they’re designing for and the mind they’re designing with.

40 chapters. Free to read. Not selling anything. No login required.
https://productdesignpsychology.com

there’s been a lot of talk lately that design/product judgment and taste are what will matter in the future because AI is making execution cheaper.

I’m still early in my career and if judgment is the moat against AI, I assume I should be doing everything I can to strengthen it. the thing is, I’m not sure what to do.

there have been times where I asked senior designers/PMs why a certain flow was used, but they don’t remember why. if judgment really is the moat, then it seems like everyone should keep track of this stuff. curious to hear how other people deal with this:

1. how important is logging design decisions and does anyone have a system in place to do this?
2. and if judgment is a durable skill against AI, is it something that can be constantly developed?