Helping keep small businesses hydrated – Zip Micro wins gold in Australia’s International Good Design Awards

In a testament to our commitment to innovation, health and wellbeing, Zip Micro has been announced as the winner of the Good Design Award Gold Accolade in the Product Design Domestic Appliances category in recognition of outstanding design and innovation.



Small businesses account for almost 98 per cent of our nation’s 2 million businesses and employ 2.2 million Australians.

We developed Zip Micro after we discovered there was a market need for our classic HydroTap to be adapted to fit in compact kitchens found in small workplaces of up to 10 people. The adaption called for us to streamline the HydroTap’s under-bench smart command centre, that enables boiling and chilled water to be dispensed at the touch of a button, so it could fit in smaller spaces.

By developing the Zip Micro, we have exposed a whole new market to all the benefits of the HydroTap who otherwise would’ve had to go without. These benefits include improved hydration and the elimination of single-use plastic bottles.

Staying hydrated is critical to our health and wellbeing. It’s particularly important in the workplace, as studies show even mild dehydration negatively impacts mood, attention, memory and motor coordination. Eighty per cent of HydroTap customers report drinking noticeably more water than they did before they had access to the product.

By creating the Zip Micro, our product was able to make the under-bench smart command centre 37 per cent narrower than the traditional HydroTap models, giving the millions of Australians who work in smaller workplaces access to the HydroTap for the first time. This was done all without losing any of the performance of the original HydroTap.

The annual Good Design Awards are Australia’s oldest and most prestigious international awards for design and innovation with a proud history dating back to 1958. The 2020 edition of the awards were particularly competitive, with a record-number 835 project entries.

The Good Design Awards Jury praised Zip Micro, commenting: This is a clever new version of a design classic – the original Zip HydroTap. It’s a sophisticated space and energy saving design, which has helped the HydroTap enter a new market.

The Zip Micro was designed and manufactured in our factory located in Condell Park in western Sydney. It’s one of the first new products to have been designed and manufactured on our new factory line, the result of a $6 million investment made in 2019 to help double our manufacturing capacity to meet growing international demand.

Here at Zip, we see this latest award win as testament to our dedication to innovation and our commitment to improving health and wellbeing for as many people as possible. Of course, this has been made possible thanks to the hard work of our talented people.

This is the just the latest in a long line of innovation – and we’ve got some exciting new product development in the pipeline. Stay tuned.