Pasta Pasta is an in-store app that saves time for tech-savvy customers on the go. It removes the pain of long in-store wait times with an innovative, seamless user interface. My role was to research, design, and test all UI’s related to the project.
Project Overview
Research
This competitive research helped me establish the market and precise target demographic that I wanted to focus on. After I collected information from as many external sources as possible, I had to go deeper. I created an initial spectrum of potential users, each in different economic spectrums. An extensive survey was sent out to many people within my target demographic.
The survey helped develop a more detailed set of people that would use this app, as well as their motivations, reasoning, and financial situations. I then interviewed people that fell within this initial spectrum of patterns for the most ideal users and solidified exactly what their general personality was. These interviews resulted in the development of a comprehensive set of detailed personas.
Researching the Competition
I spent the first-week downloading numerous restaurant apps — especially those marketed towards millennials. All in all, there was a complete lack of structure for the order in-app feature for premium pasta, whereas the Chipotle and Panera Bread apps both had a clean and modern UI design and an onboarding experience to match.
Chipotle
- Clean onboarding experience
- High-quality relevant imagery
- Recognizable icons
- Allows to see the menu and use of the app without an account
Panera Bread
- Clean reward system
- Branding is evident throughout the app
- Recent orders easily located in the app
- User-centered
User Interviews + Synthesis
To find the answer, I asked users why they visit restaurants and what’s important for them when selecting the right one. I put the results of the interview on stickers and grouped similar ones to find patterns.
We created a simple survey via Typeform.com and sent it out to all of our friends on Facebook and posted the link to the survey in numerous “Foodies” and food groups.
User segmentation
User Personas
I used the personas method to better understand my users. I had two main types of target users — people who like to explore new places and people who want to save money on their favorite restaurants.
After hypothesizing two different archetypes, I used them as guides to discuss user goals, pain-points, and behavior. I prioritized the phases of the project according to the persona types designated. Megan and Ralph, our primary personas, were the main focus of the project. I used these personas throughout the entire project to ensure that all design decisions were user-focused and that requirements were met.
Job Stories
Personas help me to understand for whom this product is. Job stories helped me to concentrate on their needs and the context of use. As I’ve defined the main users’ needs, now I can create job stories:
Early Stage Wireframes
Paper Prototypes
After a comprehensive series of initial whiteboard sketches, digital wireframes were made using Sketch.
Every interaction present in the aforementioned user flow was pinpointed, and a priority was made to minimize clicks for the core experience, all while keeping the app as simple but functional as possible.
Building It Out
Lo-Fi Prototype
Early on, prototyping and user testing were performed to make sure it was easy for users to follow the user flow and understand the functionality of the app. Three rounds of wiring, prototyping, testing, and iterating were made to result in the current design of the app.
User Flow + Mid-Fi Prototype
Visual Design Language
Darkish Red
#AC0000
Whisper
#E9E9E9
Tungsten
#515255
