Reimagining online cookware shopping experience

Mar 14

The case study talked about how we reimagine cookware online store for Meyer – a new brand that focuses on high-quality products that help people create better food. We were looking for a e-commerce site with strong brand presence with great story-telling.

📁 Project

Meyer brand online store (2018)

💪 My role

Leading role in UX UI team (1 Intern + 1 designer)

Coordinate with global marketing lead & e-commerce manager

Communicate with vendor

👥 Target audiences

Food lover millennial over the world

📍Market

Global

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How might we…

How might we design an E-Commerce website that tell the brand & products story effectively?
How might we help customers to shop cookware online while most of them are used to shop cookware physically?
How might we encourage customers to make purchase decision?

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Research & discovery

#1 Cookware Competitors Analysis

There was a rising number of retailers trying to disrupt the market. They made it really successfully with their marketing strategy and storytelling. We deep-dived to learn how they sell products and tell story.

#2 Successful E-Commerce Analysis

A lot of online D2C tell their brand and products stories super effectively with a very innovative and user-friendly site. In order to learn the e-commerce trend, we analysed and benchmarked website that we found remarkable.

Successful E-Commerce with strong brand presence : Casper, Harry’s, Thirdlove, Kind Snack, Away, Thinx, Beoplay, etc..

#3 Scenario Sketching & Crazy 8's

We identified users cases and persona from research, and we started our sketching and brainstorming with different scenarios. We adopted the google crazy 8's method to help us brainstorm as the first step and revised the potential ideas as next step.

(left) me sketching (right) some old sketching

#4 User Testing

We gathered people around the world to test the prototype, all of them are home cook that shops online. Each user test lasted around one hour, starting with some questions on cooking, and then scenario tasks and ended with lots of following questions. It helped us to refine the user experience and learn more on customer cookware shopping expectations.

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Use of research findings to define our design

Discussion #1

What does customers need when buying cookware?

What we’ve learnt

📐 Trouble in understanding sizes

Many of the cookware e-shop show only number (e.g. 8″, 6QT, 3kg) which sounds very abstract for customer to imagine the size and weight balance.

👋 Love to feel cookware physically

Customers want to feel the size, weight balance and design detail, that’s why they don’t prefer to shop cookware online.

🍳 Imagine food & cooking during cookware shopping

When customers are shopping online, they always imagine food to cook with and how could the cookware help them cook better.

💡 Solution

Size guide

Help users to understand the sizes & weight vividly. Also use of food as a measure of cookware siz

In-situ photography suggestion

The UX team also provide the marketing team some In-situ Photography Suggestion that show food, cooking, lifestyle and human

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Discussion #2

How customers select cookware on online shop?

What we’ve learnt

📖 Want to read extra information in category page

Customers love to read more information than just an image to help them to decide whether they want to click into product detail page.

🛠️ Cookware compatibility is a deal breaker

Not until they confirm the compatibility with their kitchen (i.e. induction, oven safe and dishwasher safe), customers won’t be interested to know more about the products.

🛒 Looking for option to save many products in cart

Some of the customers prefers to save many products without clicking into product detail page and view all of the products in detail later.

💡 Solution

Quick view interaction

The Quick View function can help users to view all the necessary information in a tap. Show the cookware compatibility clearly in an earlier stage (i.e. induction, oven safe and dishwasher safe)

Open multiple quick views

Users can open multiples Quick View to decide which one to click to

Easy add to card

Add to card CTA that’s available in category page

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Discussion #3

How can e-commerce do more than just selling product?

What we’ve learnt

🧑‍🎓 Don't mind to learn about cookware

Customers would love to know more about cookware in order to make wiser purchase decision, such as different cookware types or material.

🍳 Know whether they need a pot or pan, that’s it

Most of them knew roughly what they needed (e.g. a pot), but they were not sure about the actual cookware type (e.g. stockpot or casserole) or size (e.g. 6qt or 7qt) or material (stainless steel or non-stick).

🎁 Want to get inspired

If customers are interested in buying cookware in the website, they wouldn’t mind to play around the website to get inspired and learnt about the products and brand. therefore, from user test a lot of users click into “Inspire” page while exploring products.

💡 Solution

Education of different cookware type

If user lands on “Pots” category page, it will clearly describe the difference between different pots type.

Cookware Dictionary

It taught customers all the necessary thing about cookware. It will also link users back to shop.

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Take away

Let’s be realistic and identify MVP earlier

The team have spent months sitting together (even with our COO) to come up with a solution that we were very much proud of.

Quotation from vendo

💸 Over our budget (quite a lot)

⌛ Required longer delivery time (literally our products would be sitting in the warehouse for months before e-shop were ready)

🙅 Some functions were denied because it was difficult to implement in Shopify

some of the workshops to prioritise functionality & identify MVP

Therefore, we’ll have to revisit the journey to identify what’s the key element/ MVP to achieve our goal within our budget and timeline. Also to evaluate based on shopify feasibility.

Wing Nam Chu

Reimagining online cookware shopping experience

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How might we…

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