▌Project Overview

You don't want to use single-use plastic for your to-go food or delivery food,
but it's hard to prepare or carry your own containers in your busy life?
Or you don't want to use plastic bags for your grocery?
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You can now use DOPE!
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Role

Lead Product Designer
Research Assistant

Duration

October to December
2022

Tool

Figma
Adobe Photoshop
Adobe Illustrator

Team

University of Washington
HCDE 518 User-centered
Design Group Project

Team Member

Abby Starnes, France Yang, Karlton Lattimore, Leah Oh

My Contribution

Conducted 2 one-day diary studies, 60minutes user interviews, and competitive analysis. Made User Personas, Design system, and User flow. Led design process from Medium fidelity to High Fidelity, and iterated design process.

We asked ourselves,
How can we do our part environmentally?

Sustainability has garnered lots of attention as research continues to show the importance of taking action to ensure a better future and environment for our future generations.
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According to a survey conducted in 2022 by the Pew Research Center, 69% of US adults favor policies in the US to become carbon neutral by 2050 [1], which means producing less carbon dioxide than is removed.
Retrieved from Pew Research Center: https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2022/04/22/for-earth-day-key-facts-about-americans-views-of-climate-change-and-renewable-energy/
Go to Final Design

▌Project Process

▌Generative Research & Synthesis

How this relates to what came before:
‍Used the background about the problem to guide the questions we ask for the generative research.
Why we created this:
To better understand users' pain points and needs and to understand existing products within the market in order to create the optimal solution.
How this relates to what came next:
The generative research was later used to create a design proposal which included design goals, storyboards, and user flow diagrams based on user feedback.
What this is:
Generative research including a diary study, follow-up interviews, a validation survey, and a competitive analysis.
Generative Research Questions
- How is plastic consumption currently incorporated within the lives of people who currently use plastic goods?
- What are pain points with reducing plastic consumption for people who currently use plastic goods? Why?
- What are the needs of people who currently use plastic goods to reduce plastic consumption? Why?

▌Research Methodology

We conducted 4 different types of research.
We used our research to scope down our design question to better address our users’ pain points.

Research 1. Diary Study + Follow-up Interview


We first learnt about users’ general experiences through a diary study and interviews

-One day diary study
:Periodic in-situ logging/snippet technique of plastic use every 3 hours
 9am, 12pm, 3pm, 6pm, 9pm
-60 min interviews
:Behavior validations and discussions around their Diary Study on the previous day
‍*View the full version of the report here.
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Research 2. Validation Survey






‍We validated these insights at scale with a survey.
-Survey questions sent out in SurveyMonkey
-Questions formed based on findings from Diary Study and interviews
-Sent to Slack channels, family and friends, Instagram, Facebook…etc.


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Research 3. Competitive Analysis

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We complimented this with market research to provide further insights
-Conduct secondary research on current solutions on tackling plastic consumption issues.
-Create a competitive analysis chart to compare the pros and cons of current solutions

*View the full version of the report here.


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Research Synthesis

In order to synthesize all the various findings we collected through the four different research methods,
we conducted affinity mapping on Figma to narrow down on several key insights. This will help us develop our persona and designs down the line.

Research Finding

1. The primary ways users use single-use plastic goods are for eating, drinking, and ordering products
2. Users mentioned that it’s hard to find alternatives to single-use plastics
3. Convenience was mentioned as a key reason for using single-use plastics
4. Users desire to reduce their usage, their motivations, and their needs were the basis for distinction between users
5. Some users feel the responsibility of plastic reduction should be on companies
6. Existing products and designs contain several features to reduce environmental issues

▌User Personas

We created personas using the research findings gathered to help guide us through our ideation and design process.
We continuously referenced back to the primary persona to make sure we are focusing on addressing the right audience our research supported.

Design Question

At this point of the process, we wrote our final HMW design question based on the research and direction of the project.
We updated to focus on single-use plastic in order to narrow our scope.
How might we encourage a plastic-free lifestyle among people who currently use plastic goods and are interested in reducing their plastic consumption?

▌Design Goal

Based on the insights and pain points synthesized through research and persona,
we ideated four different design goals to help us outline the functionality of our app.
This helps with creating the information architecture.
2.
‍Create convenient ways for users to choose reusable goods when they purchase food, drinks, or other product.
3.
‍Create a convenient alternative to users bringing their own reusable goods to stores, restaurants, or other retailers.
4.
Create a convenient alternative to users carrying their own reusable goods back to their home after leaving a store, restaurant, or other retailer.
1.
Create a convenient way for users to choose reusable goods when they purchase food, drinks, or other products in-person.

▌Target Users & Stakeholders

  • Primary target users:
    People who are interested in reducing their plastic consumption in their everyday lives.
    These users would be mindful of their plastic usage and looking for ways to reduce it.
  • Stakeholder 1 - Retailers:
    Retailers have a responsibility to provide alternative, sustainable products to consumers.
    Neighborhood restaurants who wish to participate in the program are also important stakeholders.
  • Stakeholder 2 - Food Delivery Services:
    Since our app partners with food delivery services, they also serve as a stakeholder at play within the DOPE network.

▌User Stories

We created three different user journeys story board using the four design goals that we previously listed.
It helped us ideate various solutions and imagine the ideas feasibility.
Story board 1: User buys takeout and uses the DOPE container and kiosk.
Story board 2: User goes to the supermarket and uses the DOPE kiosk to borrow reusable bags.
Story board 3: User orders food delivery service and chooses to use DOPE containers.

▌User Flow

We created a few user flows based on the user journeys to solidify the planning of what screens we need in order to provide a good user experience.
It helped us visually layout the journey a user goes through in our application.
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▌Information Architecture

Card Sorting

‍We created this to guide the creation of the medium-fidelity prototype.
How should the DOPE information content be organized in order to align with users’ mental models?
7 participants were asked to sort cards into categories that make sense to them for both our app screens and kiosk screens.
Similarity matrices for the cards tested for both the app and kiosk were created. In addition to a standardization grid, these findings helped us understand what content users associate together to influence the creation of the information architecture.

Information Architecture

▌Medium Fidelity Prototype

We created medium fidelity prototypes for a usability test


App
Medium-Fidelity Prototype link


Kiosk

Medium-Fidelity Prototype link

▌Usability Evaluation

3 moderated, remote/in-person qualitative usability study.
We decided to do a qualitative usability study because:
We were early in design development and want to focus on frequent iterations
We wanted to identify usability problems at this point in the design







We created this table in order to synthesize on user feedback received through usability testing. This was used to create a better experience in the hi-fi





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▌High Fidelity Prototype

We created this to turn our vision into reality. This will help developers fully understand what to move forward with as well.
App Main feature 1

Restaurant/Cafe Locator

-Users can search for participating restaurants/cafes
-Shows information regarding the participating location
-Users can get directions to participating restaurants/cafes
‍[Prototype Link]
App Main feature 2

Rental Status+Kiosk Locator

-Users can check the status of borrowed goods and the due date
-Users can search for nearby kiosks and get directions
-Users can view the return and rental capacity of the kiosk
[Prototype link]
Kiosk Main feature 1

Returning Reusable Goods

-Users can return reusable containers/bags directly to the kiosk after usage
‍[Prototype Link]
Kiosk Main feature 2

Borrowing Reusable Goods

-Users can borrow reusable containers/bags directly from the kiosk
‍[Prototype Link]
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Plug-in

Delivery App Plug-in

-D.O.P.E. can be used as a plug-in to the delivery app
(Doordash, Grubhub, Ubereats…etc.)
-Users can choose to use D.O.P.E containers when ordering food on the delivery app
‍[Prototype Link]

Moving Forward...

If we had more time and resources, we would continue this project by:
-Creating a physical kiosk prototype and beginning testing with users
-Pairing with a local business to begin testing integrating D.O.P.E reusable containers in restaurants
-Continuing to conduct evaluative user research and iterate based on our findings
All rights reserved © 2023 Leah Oh
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