product design CASE STUDY

Summary

Buying healthy food conveniently while still being sustainable is hard. Not many truly sustainable options are available for users to decide from, specially with greenwashing of products done by big companies makes it harder for our environmentally conscious users to make these choices. We wanted to break this cycle and offer a sustainable smarter alternative to retail.

With Mercä environmentally conscious shoppers can purchase sustainably farmed package-less food conveniently on the go through their Mercä vending machines. These machines can be accessed through their mobile phones and no payment is required at the machine to make the experience more convenient.

tools used

Invision
After Effects
Illustrator

project timeline

6 weeks

team

Grace Lim
Valery Marier
Felicity King

Role

User Research
Prototyping
UX/UI

Problem Overview

The overarching cultural narrative over sustainable products seems to be one of individual choice. A perspective that stems from Enlightenment thinking, it puts the blame on the shopper and tells them that they need to change their ways to make the world more sustainable. Yet, this flawed way of thinking fails to realize that there aren't any convenient options currently in the market to enable shoppers to change. Moreover, most ‘sustainable’ options on the market are out of the way and problematically packaged.

DESIGN CHALLENGE

How might we provide sustainable retail alternatives that are accessible, healthier and smart while uplifting local sustainable practises?

Solution

The crux of the idea for Mercä is that it is a sustainable vending machine that can essentially be placed anywhere. It avoids problematic plastic packaging by using a combination of cameras and weight sensors to dispense product into customers' reusable containers without spilling everywhere. These food products are locally produced eliminating the carbon emissions caused by international/national transport.

User Research of the problem space

uNDERSTANDING OUR AUDIENCE

Our primary audience for this product were millennials who are looking for sustainable retail products and are caught up in the capitalistic cycle of highly unsustainable packaged goods. Our initial and primary form of user research was observation & mapping user journeys through local grocery stores and retail chains like Walmart along with sustainable chains like bulk barn. Analyzing these maps we found out where the users have been provided to make a choice of sustainable alternatives and where lies their pain points and opportunities. These insights are consolidated in the chart below.

market research

To understand the environment of our users, we decided to have our primary means of research as observations. All of our groups members were tied to either sustainable stores, local grocery stores and retail chains. After series of observations and quick interviews with shoppers, we consolidated our findings with a user journey map comparing the three alternatives.

BUILDING USER PERSONAS

With our user data from observations, secondary research, user interviews and our competitor analysis, our team came up with several user personas that would provide a direction to our product design. One of them is compiled below.

Information ARCHITECTURE

After taking a dig deep in our user personas reflecting their pain points and motivations, below are some features that we came up with. Being on such a short timeline we weren't able to completely build out all the features.

Vending Machine Features

- Search product function
- Connect (scan) to login with your app
- Dispense product hold on button
- View window to see the products
- Dispense window with a digital weighing scale
- Machine should be sustainable (could have Mercä adverts playing on a digital screen)

Companion App Features

- Search by product/machine
- Reward system
- Payment & past transaction/purchase history
- Grocery List
- Map where Mercä is available with possible to have live inventory so customer knows what we have
- Digital space for awareness of ways of sustainable living

Building the solution

Visual design

To develop the branding and visual design features of the application we wanted to go with a neutral color palette setting up a warm and friendly ethos. The supporting colors would provide a strong contrast allowing users to distinguish between our tasks. To approach our youth audience, we used a typeface Poppins which has a bolder as well as a lighter tone matching our primary palette.

We used our marketing campaign with this approach in mind, our ads featured a “call to action” to learn more on our website, rather than to shop immediately, as the pressure to make a purchase in that moment may deter them from interacting with the post. We also included photos of vibrant, healthy foods made with the ingredients available at Mercä in order to showcase the products we carry and to relate our brand to health and wellness.

project ideation- initial sketching

After brainstorming the unique features of the application, our group worked to integrate them in low-fi sketches which were then developed into initial wireframes. With lots of critiques and discussions, we took the best out of each work to develop low-fidelity mockups for user testing. Below are some examples of the same.

Our product ideation process consisted of the whole team working on the looks of the vending machine with lots of initial sketching. We wanted the machine to have a smart look instead of the regular vending machines with a sleek UI that would appeal to our millennial audience. At the same time looking at the technology that would be used for measuring the user's own container.

hIGH FIDELITY QUICK PROTOTYPE

The final application allows them to sign up as a Mercä member on a mobile device as well as search up a Mercä near them.

onboarding

This process allowing the users to register as a Mercä customer and allow preauthorized payments which would generate a personalized scan code for the account to access the machine.

Browse Products

The users will be able to browse the Mercä products and see all details about sourcing and nutrition lists. You can also use location feature to check if the product is available at a Mercä near you!

Vending machine

Mercä's machine design embodies the message that our company is trying to deliver. Sleek and minimal design is integrated with the natural and biophilic feel that our earth gives us, and we provide a functional and reliable machine for our consumers. Sourcing our materials from recycled glass and repurposed wood, we strive to minimize our impact on the environment while encouraging you to do the same!

Vending machine screen

The users will be able to select products and dispense the amount they want in their own containers.

Prototype Link

feed forward thoughts

As Mercä was a quick sprint project for 6 weeks, we were not able to completely analyze our market as well as work on the user insights and feedback provided during the user testing stage.
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1. Some questions were not answered like what would we do of the products that didn’t sell? Would that be food waste? How would we ensure the freshness of the product? How can we make sure that the company is ensuring a complete sustainable lifecycle of the product?
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2. Also being a vending machine, how many products would you be selling? Is it worth just having a few products, like will the users be willing to take a trip for 3-4 goods and bring their own container? We reflected on this question as a group, the machines could also be Mercä store, like a sustainable store with the same practices.
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3. Our topic being sustainability and retail, how are other ways that we could be using the brand to build awareness among our users and attract new customers? Probably have workshops for our users that could enable them to further understand how to live a further sustainable lifestyle.

REflections

I truly enjoyed my time working on this project, the idea of sustainability intrigued me. Something that I always try to incorporate in my design work is adding the environment and the earth as a stakeholder. It's quite intriguing how our small efforts can create big change.

My group was very supportive as well as critical, our feedback and design brainstorms were intense, learning from each other and pushing each other to the best of their abilities. We grew as designers as well individuals who cared about the environment. As we used Invision for this project, it was interesting to learn a new prototyping platform and its possibilities. (but I am still a Figma geek 😬)
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Coming from all different backgrounds of design expertise and skill, we were able to leverage each other’s strengths. As a team, we were able to collaborate in a way that allowed us to elevate Mercä much further than we had anticipated. The main takeaway of Mercä was the power teamwork holds when everybody is working towards the same goal.