Four major brands have recently redeveloped their popular products to become more inclusive for people living with visual impairments. In this post, we highlight the top four companies creating innovative products for the visually impaired.
LEGO
The LEGO Foundation and LEGO Group announced a pilot project aimed at teaching braille to children living with visual impairments. The company developed customized Braille LEGO bricks to launch later this year. The studs on the bricks will represent letters and numbers to help children learn how to read Braille in an engaging way.
The company is also piloting an initiative that will see select LEGO kits provide instructions that can be picked up by voice readers. The pilot is currently being tested in four different kits: Classic LEGO, LEGO City, LEGO Friends, and LEGO Movie 2.
Photo courtesy of LEGO
Herbal Essences
Herbal Essences made its shampoos and conditioners more inclusive for people with visual impairments in January 2019. The company is doing this through package redesign where shampoo bottles have raised lines and conditioner bottles have raised dots to allow people to distinguish between the two.
Too Faced
A common issue for people with visual impairments is confusing their beauty products. Too Faced’s eyeshadow palettes have distinct smells to help users identify the different colours. Too Faced is not the only beauty company doing this either, with L’Oréal Brazil piloting audio makeup program which is teaching women to use their Maybelline products. We anticipate these two beauty brands are setting the standard for the industry in creating beauty products for the visually impaired.
Mimica
Mimica, a British company known for creating food labels, created a label that physically changes when food is expired. The label is divided into two sides. The first one always stays flat and the second bubbles up to indicate the food has expired. This innovation helps people with visual impairments from mistakenly consuming expired food.
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