McNeil Consumer Healthcare Case Study
Industry: Consumer Healthcare
Service: ITG ACCELERATE®
Transform the treatment experience so it doesn’t add insult to injury.
McNeil Consumer Healthcare (part of Johnson & Johnson) understood that treating a common ailment is an experience, not just a product. By partnering with ITG, they brought end-users directly into an iterative R&D process to design new, pleasant delivery solutions that truly met patient needs.
9
New delivery and usage solutions developed
4
Target opportunity areas uncovered through consumer exploration
3
Artists sketching product designs in real time
The Challenge
For many common ailments, the treatment itself can be unpleasant, adding frustration to an already uncomfortable situation. Dr. Steve Wiet, then Global Director of OTC Consumer Sciences at McNeil Consumer Healthcare, knew that to improve this experience, his team needed to look beyond the medicine itself and optimize the aesthetic features and physical delivery of the product. Building an innovative R&D pipeline of new devices required breaking out of the lab. To truly understand what would make treatment more pleasant, the team needed creative, articulate consumers to provide feedback at every step of the development process.
What Success Looked Like
Develop highly optimized, consumer-approved device concepts that make treating a common ailment a more pleasant experience, giving R&D a clear, insight-grounded path forward.
How We Got There
Because McNeil recognized the value of the holistic consumer experience, ITG designed a highly iterative, multi-phase co-creation project. It started before anyone even entered the room: a specialized group of Creative Consumers® associates—who all actively treated the specific condition—completed targeted homework assignments that revealed four distinct opportunity areas for enhanced delivery.
During the live session, the McNeil client team and consumers worked shoulder-to-shoulder in small groups to design physical devices that solved real-world user needs. To ensure these ideas hit the mark, each device concept was sent to an online team of Creative Consumers® associates across the country for immediate, structured feedback. Using ITG’s Forness® thinking, the online consumers detailed exactly what they liked about the ideas and offered actionable suggestions to make them even better.
While the R&D team used this live feedback to optimize the device features, three professional artists sketched the ideas in real time, bringing the concepts to life visually.
The Results
The McNeil team walked away with a profound, empathetic understanding of their consumers’ needs, along with nine entirely new delivery and usage solutions. These weren’t just rough ideas—they were fully illustrated, insight-grounded concepts ready for R&D. Each concept included detailed physical descriptions, clear consumer benefits, design options, and a strong rationale for development.
This project used ITG ACCELERATE® — Consumer co-creation meets innovation velocity.
Build Your Pipeline Directly With Your Consumers
When you bring your end-users into the design process, you get to market-ready solutions faster. ITG ACCELERATE® helps you turn complex consumer needs into actionable product concepts with speed and substance.