Case Study : Plan and Subscribe for Weekly & Monthly Grocery Shopping
UI UX Case Study| Design Hackathon | Grocery Delivery Application
OVERVIEW
This project began for a design-a-thon that was done with a team of 5 members in a 48 hour timespan. The project is all about how to help people in tracking their groceries and planning what to order when before it finishes.
PROBLEM STATEMENT
Due to the pandemic, there has been a high rise in ordering groceries online but users generally don’t remember all of the items available at their residence. Design a subscription model for a popular grocery delivery app to keep track of the regular items they might want so that it becomes easier for the user to place an order in one go with all the necessary items.
Why was this problem statement taken?
I wanted to take this problem statement forward because I felt that as during pandemic almost all the family members are living at home, their grocery needs have increased and each family member’s need is difficult to track down. While working on this problem statement, we would be able to make grocery shopping more organised for the whole family.
Others agreed that this is a real problem in the current situation and as many new users have started using the online grocery service lately, we can cover more audience by solving this problem.
PLAN OF ACTION
As we had only 48 hours to complete this project, we decided to divide our work among ourselves. Brainstorming and providing solutions to the problems was decided to be done in a group.
I wanted to use my skills as a UX researcher so I contributed more towards Primary research, Analyzing the research and providing with solutions. I also helped and gave feedback to my team whenever they needed me.
HYPOTHESIS
Understanding of Problem Statement
The current scenario has converted most of the users into buying groceries online. Users are facing issues to keep proper track of the items which gets finished or ordered. As users are ordering on a regular basis online, they need a platform where they can keep track and order again if needed. Users are stockpiling groceries during this pandemic especially necessary items as they are afraid they won’t be able to order them again.
I initiated the idea of understanding the problem statement and not just writing down why we took it as I felt this could help the team in opening their minds towards the problem and could further help in writing down subproblems.
Sub-problems
Writing down Sub-problems helped all of us in identifying the different areas where the problem is focusing upon and to deepen our knowledge regarding the problem we are dealing with.
Scoping Down the sub-problems
We decided to scope down our sub-problems as it would not be possible to solve each and every problem.
I felt that the another scoping down of the Subproblems was needed after one because there still were too many problems to solve for.
- Users might not know how long a product would last and when would they need to re-purchase it and find it difficult to keep a track of their groceries like how much is left, what have they run out of
- Due to high rise of online orders, people don’t find all their necessary items in stock at one go and then forget if they ordered it or not.
- Users have to choose all the items again when reordering.
- Buyers are unable to buy fresh seasonal fruits or vegetables. I initiated the idea of scoping down problems two times so that we could narrow down more as we can’t solve too many problems.
Assumptions
We then made assumptions of users and the industry around the sub problems in order to help in the brainstorming exercise as well as to dig deep inside the problem and think of it from every perspective.
Assumptions of User — i) Users often repeat their order with 1–2 additional items or without 1–2 items.
ii) Users are unable to shop for all the grocery items from one application.
iii) Users forgets to add the out of stock item in the next order.
iv) Sometimes user might want a certain item in lesser quantity than a fixed limit. So user might not want to place order online rather buy from market directly.
v) Users find it difficult to calculate the rate of consumption of a product at their home.
vi) Users add items to cart when they run of it and order all items at once.
I reminded that assumptions for business are as important as assumptions for users and that would help us to understand our product background better.
Assumptions of Business/Product — i) Vendors are finding it difficult to keep a stock of all items as the customers order more than what is needed
ii) the grocery applications are trying to remind their customers when the item is available (back in stock)
iii) Farmers can’t sell their seasonal fruits or vegetables rs aren’t able to buy fresh fruits and vegetables even though customers would like to order
iv)Due to sudden rise of orders online, employees who would deliver the packages are less.
v) Business would like the users to make online payments and don’t accept COD.
Brainstorming
Brainstorming at this stage helped us in making good hypothesis.
I helped in brainstorming and voting down the best ideas of the whole group and then I initiated the plan to make a user flow of our ideas in order to synchronize them.
The solutions selected from Brainstorming were put into a flow diagram with relevant categories to have a flow in which the user would be using the application and to see how at every stage the solutions given would be helpful.
Hypothesis Statements
Based on the sub-problems, assumptions, and solutions, we now came up with hypothesis statements to be validated by research. This gave us a base guideline which will help to direct our research.
I put down the framework of the hypothesis statement for the group so that they could write in that manner. It helped in putting our assumptions along with the solutions.
- Our hypothesis is that connecting the local vendors to the users would help them as our assumption is that they don’t trust buying fruits and vegetables from the application directly.
- Our hypothesis is that the users are provided with a subscription plan which records their orders, then uses this order history to plan the future orders with a certain amount of automation because Our assumption is that users forget and are not able to preplan the orders.
- Our hypothesis is that users need a separate tab for monthly and daily grocery subscriptions as our assumption is that they need different items at different times.
- Our hypothesis is that the users might want to re-order the previous order because our assumption is that most users repeat their previous order and this will save their time.
- Our hypothesis is that users need reminders for the items which are to be restocked as our assumption is that they tend to forget that they missed it last time.
- Our hypothesis is that users might need alternative recommendations for the items not in stock in their list because our assumption is that it would help them save time and effort.
- Our hypothesis is that the future of a grocery store is personalized, customer-oriented, available anywhere, emotional, flexible, connected, and uses the latest technologies in a pandemic situation as our assumption is that users need more help while ordering groceries online.
- Our hypothesis is that a feature of estimation of products soon to be over can be added or suggested because our assumption is that users may not remember to buy items.
RESEARCH
Desk Research
The desk research helped us gain insights into the rise of online grocery shopping and how users’ spending habits have changed.
Various insights were discovered and some hypothesis were proved and disproved.
Statistical Insights
- 80% people shopped for groceries online for convenience and not for price.
- 65% of consumers in this study were unable to buy the fresh food they wanted because it was out of stock during the pandemic
- 44% replaced item with alternative fresh food.
- 20% of users had more than 4 items running out-of-stock in their cart.
- the token size for essentials, especially groceries online has increased to over 70% during the lockdown.
- 64% percent of contemporary (younger families, more well-off, urban dwellers) consumers say it is important to buy Branded Fresh food but only 44% conventional (Tend to be older, lower-income, and more rural) user rely on branded food.
Behavioral Insights
- People are spending way more during the pandemic than they otherwise would on groceries.
- Because of pandemic very less people tried to buy in alternative stores or to check out different store.
- Most of the users replace the item that is out of stock with another one and they might reconsider buying the replacement when making the same choice in future also.
- Online grocery Shoppers turn to reviews while shopping.
- Users don’t want to put extra effort while searching for replacements for their out-of-stock items.
- Contemporary user is ready to pay more for fresh food in comparison to conventional user.
Target Audience
We set a target audience to not lost direction during our primary research.
First I insisted to make it more specific so that it is easy for us to narrow down our research but then because of my team I understood that it would be difficult to find users with a specific trait at that point of time.
User Research
We created an interview guide and conducted six user interviews based on our target audience by interviewing the people within our reach.
In user research, I helped to make interview guide and took two interviews of students/bachelors based on our type of users required.
Top User Insights
User 1
- ordering habits like she likes to order when running low on items.
- Switch to online shopping due to the pandemic as she prefers buying the groceries from the stores directly
- Lack of information keeps her from trying new vendors.
User 2
- Items which gets over early are ordered on a weekly basis and those which gets over after a month are ordered on a monthly basis.
- They are comfortable buying fruits and vegetables from the grocery stores and not necessarily from local vendors
User 3
- If any item isn’t available, then he go for alternative items instead of waiting for the item to get in stock.
- Don’t re-order from previous orders but go for searching for them all over again as he could look for alternatives too in that manner.
User 4
- Don’t re-order from previous orders but go for searching for them all over again as he could look for alternatives too in that manner.
- Orders 5 times in a month by making shopping list every week.
User 5
- Orders 3 times in a month from Amazon Pantry. Sometimes from Big basket.
- Scared what if stock ends so buy products in bulk.
User 6
- Don’t get time to make shopping list like to buy after scrolling ads.
- prefer to buy from online platform due to office working hours
ANALYSIS
Affinity Mapping
The insights were then used to identify behavior groups through Affinity Mapping which would help further in making Empathy Mapping and Personas.
I suggested for second iteration of Affinity Mapping as I thought for some user patterns we need a deeper perspective to form empathy maps and personas.
User Groups
These were decided on the basis of the user patterns we got from affinity mapping.
- Planner — A person who does organized shopping and makes a separate list for weekly and monthly grocery shopping.
- Spontaneous — A person who forgets to buy his grocery on time and buy it at last moment.
Empathy Maps
This task helped us know the user better and how they said, think, act and feel.
Validation of Hypothesis
Validation of Hypothesis Statements helped in clarifying which solutions and assumptions could be taken into consideration for HMWs.
I helped in validating Hypothesis statements through primary research data and noting down those which were not validated or proved wrong.
Personas
Based on the empathy maps, we created two user personas. This helped in defining our users and understanding their goals and frustrations.
I suggested the team that goals and frustrations which are written in Persona are important for writing down HMWs questions as hypothesis statements which were validated aren’t enough.
HMWs
The HMW Questions helped us identify user pain-points and the problems to be solved.
I helped the team in choosing the final HMWs as we had a lot of repeated ones and the ones which were not focusing on our problem statement.
- HMW help the user not miss ordering an item that they actually need on a monthly or weekly basis?
- HMW help the user make a list for their weekly and monthly needs?
- HMW help the user not spend too much time selecting a product and placing an order?
- HMW help users with a faster shopping experience if they want to repeat their previous orders ?
- HMW help the user when the item they’re searching is out of stock?
- HMW help users in planning their shopping list so that they don’t forget any items ?
- HMW make sure that the user orders the items before running out of it?
- HMW make sure the users receive products urgently when they are low in supplies?
- HMW help the user to not miss out on deals?
IDEATION
Brainstorming
This process was fun. With a timer in place, our team came up with various solutions for the HMW questions. The solutions were then narrowed down by voting.
During ideation stage, some of the ideas weren’t taken forward as we realized we can’t showcase them within this short timespan. We decided to put them for future plan.
Solutions and Features
- Subscription Plan: It will allow users to subscribe to the delivery services weekly/monthly/daily dairy products.
- Order Subscription: It will allow users to subscribe to a set of items repeatedly getting delivered monthly/ weekly/bi-weekly.
- Make a List : This feature will help the users to create and save their list of items which can be used repeatedly for placing the order.
- Repeat Last Order: This feature will let users re-order past delivery items without the need of selecting them individually again.
- Notifications/ Reminders: This Feature will help users get the best deals. They would also be notified when a sold-out item is back in stock.
Wireframes
The Feature-led solutions were now converted into wireframes to see how they might work and impact the experience of the users.
In Low Fidelity wireframes, I suggested ideas for subscription plan, order subscription and Shopping list. I also helped in contributing and inputting my feedback towards the selected ideas.
User Flow
A User Flow was created to better explain the flow in which the solution would be working along with the features which were thought of.
I made the final user flow of the idea comprising the solutions and features after taking feedback from my group members.
PROTOTYPE
After wireframing the solutions, UI Screens were made based on the selected wireframes. We named our grocery delivery application QuickMart.
FUTURE SCOPE
The future of online grocery shopping lies in more personalized and customized services while keeping it simple enough for all kinds of users to use. The future possibilities are endless with some of them mentioned below.
- A tracking chip put on the containers of a few important groceries which tells the container refill status to the app automatically. And with a notification alert, we can order the stock required.
- A bot that works in association with google assistant or Alexa and it will help us to make list items with simple narration.
- Helping users keep a track of their groceries like how much is left, what have they are running out of, and automatically add items to the cart using their previous shopping likes and dislikes.
- Making sure that the brand they bought in past and had a bad experience with is not recommended to them and instead recommend them to try new alternatives if possible.
LEARNINGS
- Team Collaboration and Time Management are the key for a successful project.
- Unlearning something which is not right is also important.
- Your ideas may not work for the problem but still you learnt patience and perseverance.