Lance

Arevalo

Project Info

— Timeline
2 week design sprint

— Role - Solo Project
User Research, User Interviews, Wireframing, UI Design, Prototyping, Usability Testing

The Client - Riley's Flowers

With their large selections of flowers along with great prices, it's no surprise that they're a local favorite in the community in Santa Barbara, CA. They've been in the business for a while thanks to their solid skills as a florist. They currently have an e-commerce site where customers can browse through selections of bouquets and get it delivered to loved ones.

The Issue

I was interested of tackling a redesign of their current website to improve any shortcomings in the shopping experience. After doing a usability testing with their current website, results indicated that users are experiencing a troubles specifically in the browsing experience resulting a high bounce rate within the site.

Here's my game plan for the flower shop.

1. Research

2. Mid Fid Results

3. Define

4. The Problem

5. High Fidelity

Let's first empathize.

Coming from the initial research, we'll be establishing that the premise of gifting flowers is the main concept of the experience.
Who do you usually buy flowers for?
61% - Gifted to others
39% - Personal Household
When do you usually buy flowers?
92% - For occasions
8% - Routinely
So let’s dive deeper and ask: Why flowers as a gift?
I tackled the research with an oblivious attitude; let’s get the users advocate for flowers and reveal their habits.
Comparative Analysis
Why flowers as a gift?
—Although flowers are more expensive, the data shows that people are okay to splurge since the value is there.

—Both chocolate and flowers are temporary items, but flowers have wider impact not just to the body but one's space as well.
Competitive Analysis
Why a local florist?
—Grocery stores will have a tug of war with florist since they're conveniently available with other products and often cheaper

—The ability to support local business can make the experience of going to a florist better for users

The current website needs some quick fixing.

Goal 1: Success, kind of

There were only, in total, 5 instance of users clicking back...

But it occurred in every single tester.
Task: Your task is to buy a birthday present for a loved on which will be a bouquet of daises.
We’re going straight into a mid-fidelity prototype usability test with two goals.
Goal 1: Reduce the amount of times of clicking back, an issue with the current website.
Goal 2: Failure with the prototype but success for the research
Goal 2: Get further insights on how people shop for a “I’m thinking of you” scenario
—Failure how?

Because the task inspired users to come up with their specific bouquet, the prototype did not deliver a seamless experience.
"My mom is really into gardening and would re arranging the flowers she receives. She would take the flowers and put it one of vases. I haven't been home for a while but I'm sure if my mom got flowers, she would put it in the kitchen table."

-Tester 1
"When it comes to flowers, it makes total sense if a bouquet that has big and grand will be expensive. And if I'm really feeling like that the event deserves something like that, I'd totally splurge."

-Tester 2
"I honestly don't know what my mom would like in flowers but if I were given options, I'm pretty sure I can get a sense of what my mom would like. I'd spend time browsing for sure."

-Tester 3
—Success why?

That failure inspired the users to talk about their motivations and goals.

Define

Given those insights, we’ll be narrowing the focus on the browsing experience.
Moving forward, we’ll be keeping in mind two users.
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1. Tristan who knows what he wants to be in the bouquet.
2. Sally who is open to seeing what options she has for her bouquet.
Combined together, the design needs to be both intuitive and engaging.
Tristan, Age 34
Originally from Santa Barbara, CA
Current City: Boston, MA
Tristan and his wife are both originally from Santa Barbara and moved to Boston for work opportunities. They love sending flowers to their loved ones as a thoughtful gift since they don't live there anymore.
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"I rarely go back to Santa Barbara so I send over thoughtful gifts to my loved ones who still live there."
Goals
— To send quality flowers to loved ones.
— To support local business.

Needs
— To connect with loved ones back home
— To send specific choices of flowers

Frustrations
— Cannot find the specific bouquet he has mind
— Lost of trust on products with the lack of info
Scenario: Tristan wants to send a bouquet of flowers to his mother as a gesture that he misses her. He wants it to be thoughtful so he’s looking for a bouquet that has his mother’s favorite flowers: red roses and white lilies.
Sally, Age 20
Originally from Santa Barbara, CA
Current City: Chicago, IL
Sally moved to Chicago from Santa Barbara to attend college. With the pandemic, she’s been refraining herself from travelling back to home to her parents. She’s not sure when she can come back home, so she’s been thinking of a way to get connected with her parents.


"You always remember receiving flowers and it’s always nice experience to have them in the house."
Goals
— To send quality flowers to loved ones.
— To support local business.

Needs
— To connect with loved ones back home
— To send any beautiful flowers

Frustrations
— Limited variation within presented options
— Lost of trust on products with the lack of info
Scenario: Sally wants to send a bouquet of flowers to her mother as a gesture that she misses her. She doesn’t know just yet what flowers she wants to be in it and would like to see her options.

The Problem

Problem Statement
Since stay home orders took effect, flower deliveries helped connect people to their loved ones. Customers need both an intuitive and engaging browsing experience when searching for the perfect bouquet because flowers hold a lot of emotional impact.

High Fidelity

Main Feature
Let's put pretend that a search button doesn't exist. How can we design efficiency and enjoyable together in one experience when it comes to sorting?

That was the question I kept in mind when designing these "cards".

Reflection

The overarching goal of this case study is to improve the business of my client that had a few hiccups to begin with. Coming into this study, I wasn't interested in the easy fixes: better information architecture, clearer navigation, etc.. Rather, I was looking forward to the very beginning steps because I knew it was in the user interviews where I'll find interesting insights.
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As a designer, playing the part of neutrality is the most exciting for me. Of course, I know why I would personally buy flowers for my mom, but when you hear other people what their mom's would like, you get a lot unique but relevant data.
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What would I have done differently?
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I would allocated more time to synthesize the research findings in more thoughtful and coherent visual storytelling artifacts. At the end, I had more excitement to show what was happening rather than with what I ended up having.

Lance Arevalo

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Made by yours truly
Lance Arevalo 2022