Roastraft, located in Westham, made a significant investment in roasting machines. With a vision to promote their freshly roasted coffee beans and a desire to tap into a broader audience, the cafe recognized the urgent need to transition online. This digital move aimed not only to increase their sales but also to offer a convenient platform for loyal customers and attract potential customers.
Lack of Digital Infrastructure: Roastraft's inability to allow customers to order or subscribe to their offerings online.
Promotion Hurdle: A need to spotlight their new location and the story behind it, facilitated by their new roasting machines.
Budget Budget limitations for design and develop teams.
Timeframe A tight deadline of three months to go live.
Accessibility Ensuring the platform is accessible to all users, considering the diverse clientele.
Our initial market survey identified that 77% of respondents in the area preferred ordering coffee online. Furthermore, 65% expressed interest in monthly coffee subscriptions if offered by their favorite local cafe.
The design journey spanned less then 3 months (10 weeks)
From feedback gathered from 78 survey respondents and 10 one-on-one user interviews, the following challenges faced by users were identified in alignment with Roastraft's project goals
Many users expressed difficulty in finding local cafes that offer online subscription services. This aligns with the project's goal to develop an online platform for users to explore and subscribe to their favorite Roastraft products.
Reordering their favorite coffee or navigating through the platform wasn’t always straightforward. This insight emphasized the need to streamline the online subscription and ordering process.
Users reported that some coffee websites they visited were not optimized for mobile devices, leading to a frustrating browsing and ordering experience. This highlighted the need for Roastraft's platform to be mobile-responsive, ensuring a seamless user experience across all devices.
A significant number of users mentioned that basic information about the coffee shop was often missing or hard to locate. This omission impacts user engagement and trust, aligning with the goal to improve user engagement and loyalty.
From these identified pain points, we formed the following HMW (How Might We) questions:
This directly ties in with the goal to develop an online platform that's user-centric.
Given the importance of mobile responsiveness, this question aims to prioritize user experience across all devices.
Streamlining user actions will directly enhance user engagement and satisfaction.
Giving users a comprehensive understanding of the cafe will foster trust and improve loyalty.
We explored three different design templates
With the insights from the 10 detailed interviews and active participation from the coffee shop owner, Template C was chosen. It captured Roastraft's essence while being functional and user-friendly.
We undertook a comprehensive testing phase with our prototype, choosing a diverse group of 12 users. This group was curated to include both tech-savvy individuals and those less familiar with online shopping, ensuring a wide range of perspectives.
We undertook a comprehensive testing phase with our prototype, choosing a diverse group of 12 users. This group was curated to include both tech-savvy individuals and those less familiar with online shopping, ensuring a wide range of perspectives.
Following the feedback, our design went through crucial iterations to better cater to user needs
A comprehensive style guide was prepared, ensuring brand consistency. It highlighted the color palette, typography, iconography, and UI components.
This project served as an invaluable lesson in the intricate balance between business objectives, user needs, and design principles. Here are some of the key takeaways and reflections: