Anthropometry - Biggest short coming in current car design and a way to lose ~70% of your customer!

Anthropometry - the scientific study of the measurements and proportions of the human body - is often being overlooked or ignored by many car manufacturers.

How can you design a car for US markets (and even global) without understanding your customer?

Our latest national Size Survey (#Size NA) comply with data from CDC that over 70% of the US population is overweight, and over 30% obese (BMI ≥ 30). How can it be that some car manufacturers are still working with human models that do not reflect this reality?

Thankfully the major part of US and European manufacturer are participating in Size NA. They understand the signs of the times.

If you still relying solely on 2D templates or old size surveys for your vehicle packaging you need to reconsider your approach...

An interesting fact from our Size NA survey... (I have to say that we not just only measured over 18,000 people, we also asked people 65 demographic questions).

One question is about how participants are rating the comfort of their seat. Interestingly the same car (brand and make) was number 3 in the ranking for "good" and "bad". So, we looked who said "good" and who said "bad". Surprisingly the average BMI of people saying "good" was below 25 and above 25 for people said "bad".

If you don’t want to lose ~70% of your customer, contact me!!!!

Fig 1 – Left: 300lbs statistical avatar based on multiple Size NA scans of 300lbs test subjects, Right: corresponding RAMSIS manikin with large waist circumference an hip breadth

Fig 2 - 3D Body Scan in sitting posture showing pelvis width

Fig 3 - 3D Body Scan in sitting posture showing buttock knee length