Ergonomic Vegetable-Vendor Pushcart with Shade, Insulated Cold Box and Fold-Out Display (Rhino/KeyShot)

This B.Des graduation project designs a pushcart for mobile vegetable and fruit vendors in Indian cities — the thela-walas and gaadi vendors who push a loaded cart several kilometres through residential lanes every day. The typical cart is a wooden or angle-iron platform on bicycle wheels, built by a local fabricator with no attention to the vendor's body or to the produce.

Field research with vendors in two neighbourhoods showed recurring problems: push handles at the wrong height causing back and shoulder pain, heavy carts that are hard to steer on broken roads and ramps, no protection from sun and rain for the vendor or the produce, leafy greens wilting by noon, and a display that has to be unpacked and re-stacked at every stop. Vendors also asked for a place to lock the day's cash and a way to show a UPI QR code clearly.

The project follows a product-design process: user research (shadowing, interviews, body-mapping of pain), Indian anthropometric data from Chakrabarti's NID study, task analysis, concept sketching, 1:5 scale models, Rhino modelling, a CMF study comparing powder-coated MS tube, HDPE and treated bamboo, KeyShot renders, a full-scale working prototype built with a local fabricator, and user trials with vendors. The final cart has an adjustable handle, a lighter frame, a fold-out tiered display, a detachable shade canopy and an evaporative-plus-insulated cold box for greens — at a cost vendors could realistically afford.

Abstract

Mobile vegetable vendors are among the most visible workers in Indian cities, yet the carts they use every day are improvised and physically punishing. This project studies vendors' routines, bodies and working conditions and designs a pushcart that reduces physical strain, protects produce and vendor from the weather, speeds up setting up at each stop, and stays within a realistic price for vendors. The design is developed through scale models and a full-size prototype and evaluated in user trials.

Introduction

The Street Vendors (Protection of Livelihood and Regulation of Street Vending) Act, 2014 recognises vending as a legitimate livelihood, and many cities have begun issuing vending certificates and designating vending zones. However, very little design attention has gone into vendors' equipment. Carts are made by local fabricators from angle iron, plywood and bicycle wheels, and they have hardly changed in decades.

Existing product vs proposed product

• Existing: fixed handle height regardless of the vendor's stature; heavy angle-iron and plywood frame; small, narrow wheels that catch in potholes; flat deck with produce piled in baskets; tarpaulin tied to bamboo poles for shade; no cold storage; cash kept in a pouch.
• Proposed: handle adjustable across the range of Indian adult elbow heights; lighter tubular frame with a lower centre of gravity; larger wheels with a simple brake; a fold-out three-tier display that opens in under a minute; detachable shade canopy; a cold box combining insulation with evaporative cooling for greens; a lockable cash drawer and a QR-code panel.

Research gap

Ergonomic studies of Indian manual carts and handcarts exist in occupational-health literature, and design schools have explored vending kiosks for fixed locations, but few projects design a mobile pushcart through full-scale prototyping and user trials with vendors, with costs checked against what vendors pay local fabricators. This project addresses that gap.

Feasibility

• Manufacturing: the design uses processes available in any town — tube bending, MIG welding, sheet-metal work, powder coating and simple moulded or fabricated HDPE parts — so a local fabricator can make it.
• Economic: material and labour costs are estimated from quotations by two fabricators, compared with the price of a conventional cart.
• User access: vendors are recruited through a vendors' association with informed consent; trials happen on their normal routes.

Mobile vegetable and fruit vendors push heavy, improvised carts for many hours every day on uneven roads, in heat and rain. Fixed handle heights, poor weight distribution and small wheels cause back, shoulder and wrist strain; lack of shade exposes vendors and produce to the sun; leafy vegetables wilt and lose value by afternoon; and unpacking and re-stacking produce at every stop wastes time. Vendors cannot afford expensive equipment, and fabricators have no design reference to work from.

The problem this project addresses is: how can a pushcart for mobile vegetable vendors be designed so that it reduces physical strain, protects produce and vendor, speeds up setting up at each stop, and can be built by a local fabricator at a cost close to that of a conventional cart? The answer must be grounded in research with vendors and tested with a full-scale prototype.

In scope

• A mobile pushcart for vegetable and fruit vendors carrying a typical daily load.
• Ergonomics of pushing, steering, braking and serving; display, shade, cold storage and cash storage.
• Materials, manufacturing processes and cost for small-batch local fabrication.
• Scale models, one full-scale prototype and user trials with vendors.

Out of scope

• Motorised or electric-assist carts (noted for future work).
• Fixed vending kiosks and vending-zone design.
• Certification or mass-production tooling.
• Detailed structural simulation; the frame is sized by established practice and tested physically.

The project follows a user-centred product-design process — research, define, ideate, prototype, test — over about 18 weeks.

Research ethics: consent explained verbally in the vendor's language; no faces or names in the portfolio without permission; trials never interrupt vendors' sales, and vendors keep their own cart available as back-up.