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IDEA AWARDS 11 – Top prize confirmed

by at 9:42 am
Filed under Big Ideas, News

Spa Breaks

For those of you who are champing at the bit to get stuck into Idea Awards 11, we  have some very good news.

This year we’re stepping the competition up a gear. This means BIGGER PRIZES & even more incentive to get your thinking caps on and encourage the creative juices to flow.

We are thrilled to announce that our top prize, which will be presented to the winner of Idea Awards 11 in the start of 2012, is £200 worth of www.spabreaks.com gift vouchers!

Spabreaks.com is the premier online Spa experience booking service on the internet, bringing you the best selection of quality UK & European health spa, detox & pamper breaks plus exclusive Special Offers.

Now part of the Palatinate Leisure Group, spabreaks.com is sister to yourgolftravel.com, Europe’s fastest growing online golf travel company, which was a BIG idea realised by university friends Ross Marshall and Andrew Harding.

Offering UK breaks as well as overseas holidays and providing luxurious stress-busting trips for incredible value, spabreaks.com are canny in an economic climate where luxury is afforded less and less. Their business sense is exceeded only by their generosity – so from everyone at All about the Idea HQ and on behalf of our creative followers, thank you to spabreaks.com for donating such a fantastic first prize.

Click Add Idea now to submit an idea and enter the competition. If you want advice on how to win, click How It Works! Good luck and let the competition begin…

A really bright idea

by at 6:55 pm
Filed under Big Ideas, Inventions

If you suffer from Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) or just think rain’s rubbish, you should check out this big idea from Valkee.

Most of us know about SAD lights – they sit in the corner of our offices delivering light into our lives and making us happier.

Surprisingly though, our eyes are not the most effective route to deliver light to the brain: the ear canal, where the skull at its thinnest, is the most effective route to direct light to where it is needed.

Amazingly, in a recent clinical trial, 25 severely depressed patients were treated with a daily dose of 8-12 minutes of light with the VALKEE bright light headset. Over a period of four weeks, nine patients out of ten experienced total relief of symptoms.

Now, that’s a bright idea.

Le Whif and Le Whaf

by at 10:33 am
Filed under Big Ideas, Inventions, News, Technology

Having come across this on Radio’s 2′s Chris Evans breakfast show, I had to find out more about this BIG idea…

Le Whif, invented by Harvard’s professor of biomedical engineering David Edwards, is pure genius or total madness.

Starting out life as an inhalator that puffs micro-particles of chocolate into your mouth, giving you the sensation of consuming a bar of chocolate without actually eating anything, Le Whif has now branched out into other areas including breathable coffee (“the kick of coffee without the cup”) and vitamins without the pills.

The dieting potential of Le Whif as a saleable product have not been overlooked and it is now being marketed as the innovation in healthy eating, though the company is keen to avoid the ‘fad’ label, which is being forced on them by rival confectioners.

I am almost 100% sure that I would never substitute a bite of chocolate brownie, however small, for a prolonged inhalation of Le Whiff and true coffee lovers would doubtless never abandon a rich espresso for a tug on a caffeine inhaler. However, I can see that it might have more medicinal rather than gastronomic appeal as a replacement to ProPlus, for example, the student lifestyle caffeine pills.

The breathable vitamins also have their benefits as numerous sections of society have significant difficulty swallowing even the most streamlined of capsules and it could be useful adapting the inhaler for elderly hospital patients or those on frequent doses of medication.

David Edwards mentioned on Chris Evans’ breakfast show that his latest product Le Whaf is also underway; an inhaler for a variety of different dishes, sweet and savoury.

Whatever you think of this invention, whether sublime or ridiculous, it has got to be admitted as an idea of seriously BIG proportions.