#167: Dr. Turner Osler: Designing Chairs to Make you Move

OVERVIEW: 

Jason A. Duprat, Entrepreneur, Healthcare Practitioner and Host of the Healthcare Entrepreneur Academy podcast speaks with Dr. Turner Osler, CEO and Founder of QOR360, a company specializing in active seating products for homes, offices and schools. Dr. Osler talks about how his chair designs help alleviate the problems caused by sitting. He also discusses his plans for educating a new generation on active sitting while supporting an ageing population with back pain.   

 

EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS:

• Dr. Osler’s background includes being an academic trauma surgeon, as well as a research epidemiologist with more than 300 peer-reviewed publications. 
• He believes Western medicine profoundly doesn’t understand back pain. 
• Our health challenge is based on the fact we often slump in our chairs for eight hours. As a result, our biochemistry suffers greatly.  
• Dr. Osler believes sitting is a catastrophe and everything is better when we’re moving. 
• QOR360 is profoundly influencing public health through it’s chair designs requiring movement. 
• Designs are based on research studying the effects of sitting and the absence of physical activities.
• To address scalability, QOR360 utilizes off-the-shelf office chair components. They  source materials and manage assembly in Vermont.
• The company’s target audience includes people who are into body mechanics and posture, and people with back pain.  
• The company is in the business of chairs to keep people moving and to change the way we sit. 
• Dr. Osler is partnering with an entrepreneur on his patent process.
• The Button Chair is designed specifically for kids and is made with lacrosse balls. 

 

3 KEY POINTS:

1. Find the problem, identify your target market, come up with an idea and work on it.
2. Work on prototypes to make a better version of the product.
3. Be open to modern ways of marketing and working with young people. Always remain adaptable to change.  

 

TWEETABLE QUOTES:

“It helps to have a skill set that sort of relates to the problem.” - Dr. Turner Osler

 

“People fail because we do not like to be told on what to do.” - Dr. Turner Osler

 

RESOURCES MENTIONED:

QOR360 Website: https://qor360.com/

Generator on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/GeneratorVT/

 

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