Designing Automatic Card Dispensers Based on Design Thinking Approach and Selecting the Suitable Alternative

Abstract

The “Historical Game Journey (HGJ) Project,” which aims to transfer cultural heritage to children through gamification, plans to deploy kiosk stations named “Information and Communication Station (ICOS)” at historical sites. Within the ICOS, there is an “Automatic Card Dispenser (ACD)” providing information cards about the historical buildings, and it constitutes a significant cost item in the project budget. In this study, with the aim of saving costs and staying within the budget, the ACD is intended to be developed instead of being purchased as a commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) product. The aim of the study is to design and develop an ACD prototype that optimally meets functional requirements and offers greater cost efficiency, specifically for implementation within the ICOS system. In this context, three alternative ACDs -with similar technologies and software but different operating principles- were designed using the Design Thinking approach, and the most suitable one was selected using the Weighted Evaluation Criteria System (WECS) method. In this way, the cost ratio of the ACD within the project budget was reduced from 21.8% to 2.42%. The developed ACD can be used practically in applications such as card games, educational kiosks and ticket vending machines used in parking lots, public transportation, highways etc. with simple adaptations. © 2025 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.