To make fundraising more interesting, we sell boxes with brownies that have been mixed by the Brownie Bot, a mixing robot made of LEGO Technic/Mindstorms parts and a K'NEX motor.
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The project began with the idea of a bake sale for fundraising. Although we could have raised some money with a bake sale, we felt that it wouldn’t attract enough customers, especially since many other clubs and organizations had the same idea. So, to stand out, Coach Sharma had the idea of robots making brownies. It sounded cool, so it would attract customers, and we could also advertise that some of our revenue would go towards Akshay Patra, in order to further support our cause.
And so the project began where normal ones finish with—branding. We had all agreed on “Bots That Bake” as a name; Julian made a logo and picked two colors, and from there prototyped packaging, which featured the signature Lego yellow as well as the Bots That Bake colors, to show how it was still part of the Legoheads.
Then came the important part—planning out what the robot would look like. The goal was to not only be able to make brownies with it, but also to show our customers how their brownies were made. Actobotics and REV kits were out of the picture, as they were needed for the main robot. Tetrix/Modern Robotics was a great system, very useful, although it looked very ordinary, which is why we decided to go with a LEGO Mindstorms base. The advantage with LEGOs was that they looked really cool when built with something large. After designing and planning out the robot, Kyle and Julian built the mixer using spare LEGO Technic pieces that remained from FLL. Reminiscing their childhood playing with LEGOs and the Mindstorms kit, the two finished it in about four hours; all that was left was programming. Rohan rapidly wrote the program for the mixer, and we immediately proceeded to bake some brownies. The outcome turned out to be surprisingly successful, as the robot was able to mix the batter rather easily
However, before the idea could be mass deployed, we needed to assess the production costs and forecast the revenue. With help from Coach, Julian made a spreadsheet outlining how much could be made in sales given a set of variables. Assuming that 100 boxes were sold, with 6 brownies per box at $5.00 and a donation of 20% to charity per box, we could make around $335 in profits, which is rather impressive!
Sales
We began our robot sales on the 31st of December, and they have been met with blistering success. Our peers have responded in overwhelming support, as we have sold 40 boxes in less than a week. This means $200 in revenue and $40 gone to charity, enough to feed 2 kids for an entire year. We are excited for the future of this project and hope to maintain the success.
And so the project began where normal ones finish with—branding. We had all agreed on “Bots That Bake” as a name; Julian made a logo and picked two colors, and from there prototyped packaging, which featured the signature Lego yellow as well as the Bots That Bake colors, to show how it was still part of the Legoheads.
Then came the important part—planning out what the robot would look like. The goal was to not only be able to make brownies with it, but also to show our customers how their brownies were made. Actobotics and REV kits were out of the picture, as they were needed for the main robot. Tetrix/Modern Robotics was a great system, very useful, although it looked very ordinary, which is why we decided to go with a LEGO Mindstorms base. The advantage with LEGOs was that they looked really cool when built with something large. After designing and planning out the robot, Kyle and Julian built the mixer using spare LEGO Technic pieces that remained from FLL. Reminiscing their childhood playing with LEGOs and the Mindstorms kit, the two finished it in about four hours; all that was left was programming. Rohan rapidly wrote the program for the mixer, and we immediately proceeded to bake some brownies. The outcome turned out to be surprisingly successful, as the robot was able to mix the batter rather easily
However, before the idea could be mass deployed, we needed to assess the production costs and forecast the revenue. With help from Coach, Julian made a spreadsheet outlining how much could be made in sales given a set of variables. Assuming that 100 boxes were sold, with 6 brownies per box at $5.00 and a donation of 20% to charity per box, we could make around $335 in profits, which is rather impressive!
Sales
We began our robot sales on the 31st of December, and they have been met with blistering success. Our peers have responded in overwhelming support, as we have sold 40 boxes in less than a week. This means $200 in revenue and $40 gone to charity, enough to feed 2 kids for an entire year. We are excited for the future of this project and hope to maintain the success.
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Lexington Legoheads | Team 11251 | (c) 2020
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