In-A-Pinch Developer Collaboration
Project Overview
Our team of UX designers worked in tandem with developers to create a recipe platform for busy millenials with limited ingredients
Scope​
UX Team: 2 Days
Dev Team: 3 Days
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Spend less time cooking
Goal
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Dislikes grocery stores
Pain Point
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Orders delivery often
Behaviour
Need
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Simple and easy recipes
I like recipes that are simple
Millennials with busy lives have very little time to shop for, prepare, and cook meals. Alex prefers to cook but doesn’t always have time to grocery shop and cook meals.
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How might we help Alex find a simple and easy way to make dinner at home?
What Do Users Want From A Recipe Site?
We Interviewed Users To Find Out
Marilyn and I conducted 5 user interviews to determine the users mental model and relevant use cases of recipe platforms that currently exist on the market. We were given a persona, but we wanted to validate and invalidate our assumptions before moving into the design phase in order to create a highly intuitive recipe platform.
Meet Alex!
Alex gets home late and wants to cook a quick and easy meal, but does not have time to go out the grocery store and shop for all the ingredients.
Who Is Our Primary User?
The UX team tested 5 users with a paper prototype to determine next steps moving into the high fidelity mockup, critical as the team would not have time for a mid fidelity prototype.
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I want to be able to search for Indian food
What Features Does Alex Need?
We Used A Design Studio To Figure It Out
The UX team designed a platform that could be put into development and tested within the scope of a few days. This meant designing for the MVP. We wanted Alex to be able to quickly look into his fridge of odds and ends and enter his ingredients to generate recipes containing those ingredients. For the ingredients Alex did not have at home, we created a grocery ordering system. Given that Alex already orders takeout frequently, ordering delivery groceries could fit into his behavior pattern.
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Filters
Searchable Database
Recipe Time Stamps
Grocery Ordering
Final Low Fidelity Design ​
What Did Users Think Of Our Low Fidelity?
Test Early, Fail Fast, and Iterate
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3/3
Users looked at recipes before adding ingredients to their cart
2/3
Users wanted a more acute filtering system
How Did We Make It Easy For Alex?
Recipe vs Ingredient Forward Design
Direct from usability testing, we found that users search by recipe versus ingredient. Once Alex finds the recipe that he wants to make, he can then click into the recipe, or click a quick view to get an overview of the ingredients and then add those ingredients to his cart with a simple click. Given that Alex is looking for simple and easy recipes, we created a platform that would minimize clicks and make it easy for Alex to get his missing ingredients delivered in record time. We created a mobile breakpoint in case Alex was on the go and wanted groceries delivered to him before he arrived home.
