Plot Luck
Repurposing the food waste produced by domestic gardeners by leveraging both technology and existing resources.
Plot luck is the solution for the gardener with extra produce on hand. Gardeners get customizable access to information on local food pantries.
View Clickable PrototypeCase Study Overview
Project Summary
Many residential gardeners will throw away extra produce at least once every year. That food waste source alone produces 42 billion lbs of waste annually. Home gardeners are not donating extra produce currently because there is no entity or platform with which they can make the necessary connections with food pantries and food banks.
The Challenge
The amount of food waste produced every year by home gardens is astounding - 42 billion pounds. This fact becomes even more staggering when compared with another: over 50 million Americans currently suffer from food insecurity. Despite there being an estimated 33,5k food pantries nationwide, they aren't resourced enough to make a larger impact on hunger statistics.
The Audience
The audience for Plot Luck was anyone with a garden at home growing fruits, vegetables and/or herbs. User experience would also depend greatly on the user's distance from nearest food pantry.
The Solution
Plot Luck is a scalable solution to the problem at hand. Users can customize their searches and contribute to the app's success by easily giving feedback on their usage. Plot Luck offers accurate and accessible information to users on an inviting and encouraging platform.
Roles
UX Research
UX Design
UI Design
Tools
Figma
Google Forms
Zoom
UsabilityHub
Client
The public transportation entity for a large midwestern city.
Timeline
3 Weeks
Phase 1 • Discover
Who will the target audience be?
There were a few demographics that I was already sure about; the target user would have a garden at home growing produce and/or herbs, live in a predominantly urban environment, and most likely care about environmental and social issues. To define additional demographics, I need to do some research. I found that...As of 2018, 18-34 year olds occupied 29% of all gardening households; Men 18-34 increased their participation in gardening by 5% in one year (from 23% in 2016 to 27% in 2017) And, 47% of home gardeners hold full-time employment.
Usability Test Screening
To recruit test participants I published a screener survey. Each survey respondent that I chose for testing had a garden at home, was between the age of 26-35, and lived in an urban area. During testing, I asked users to complete two main tasks: find details on the Sugarhouse Food Pantry; and pretend you have just donated food to Sugarhouse Food Pantry and record your donation activity.
User Personas
To leverage the research I was doing on potential users into usable deliverables for creating Plot Luck, I created two user persona; each of which represents one of the primary use cases I identified.
Jacob Berry
33 years old, Bar Owner
Portland, OR
Goals
• Reduce personal food waste
• Family bonding/quality time
• Support local community
Motivations
• High value placed on sustainability
• Wants to be more progressive in personal actions
• Sense of cultural responsibility
Frustrations
• Unpredictable growing season
• Limited time between multiple responsibilities
• Unpredictable schedule
Catherine Carrot
27 years old, Ski Patroller
Tahoe, CA
Goals
• Carry out plan to donate extra produce
• Collaborate with roommates to make as many donations as they can
• Help food pantry continue its services
Motivations
• Extensive knowledge of micro gardening and food insecurity
• Professional experience working with organizations involved in food systems
Frustrations
• Unpredictable growing season
• Miscommunication with roommates
• Unpredictable start and end to work season
Phase 2 • Define
Bringing the Users to Life
After being introduced to Plot Luck's users, I developed experience maps for persona 1, Jacob Berry. In order to create this, I referred to the research and notes I had collected and maintained an empathetic approach throughout. Having the experience maps allowed me to develop a better understanding of what rolling out Plot Luck's value proposal would look like. I gained insights into a user's relationship to the scope of Plot Luck, as well as their needs and expectations.
The insights I gained from the empathy map complimented those I gleaned from making the journey map. I felt more confident in my decision to focus on the 'search' and 'add activity' flows. I saw that there was space for rewarding/encouraging users.
Information Architecture
I needed to define the specific problems I would be solving for, and turn them into goals for the design.
I did this with a How Might We exercise, where I brainstormed all possible solutions. This resulted in two primary goal statements. I chose them specifically because they related to the features and flows that I thought would be instrumental in creating a positive user experience, which are: customizable search function; and recording donation activity.
After doing work to define the scope of Plot Luck and the main goals it will help users accomplish, I began ideating further in the form of sketches and visual representations.
I made a user flow which clearly demonstrates the two user stories mentioned above. I was able to combine these stories into one user flow, included below.
SKETCHING WIREFRAMES
I needed to define the specific problems I would be solving for, and turn them into goals for the design.
I did this with a How Might We exercise, where I brainstormed all possible solutions. This resulted in two primary goal statements. I chose them specifically because they related to the features and flows that I thought would be instrumental in creating a positive user experience, which are: customizable search function; and recording donation activity.
Phase 3 • Develop
PAPER PROTOTYPING
I supported the direction I was taking with my wireframes by making paper prototypes of my app to do some initial usability testing. Similar to a journey map, this was useful in helping me visualize the different touchpoints and steps of each user flow.
CLICKABLE LOW-FIDELITY PROTOTYPE
I then began to iterate upon the wireframes and prototype them. I kept myself on track by asking:
• Is everything I'm doing to find the most simple and intuitive solution?
• Could it be easier to look at?
• Could this be easier to use?
View Lo-Fi Prototype
USABILITY TESTS
I conducted remote usability tests over Zoom to test the preliminary iterations of the clickable lo-fi prototype; those that most recently followed the wireframes. With video also on, users shared their screens as they navigated the Figma prototype of Plot Luck. Throughout each of my five test sessions, I prompted users with open-ended questions and tasks to perform that I hoped would expose insights into users' opinions and behaviors.
All questions and tasks that I prompted participants with were deliberately designed to offer insights into one of the following:
• Completing a customized search for a food pantry
• Finding and completing the form to record donation activity
Things that were not working:
- 4/5 participants didn't find the CTAs obvious
- All participants said they'd be more likely to socially share if there was a prompt
- I needed to improve the information architecture to better direct the user to fulfill their goals
- The ease of use I had hope would be present when users recorded activity did not translate that way; I needed to redo this process to better indicate clickables and CTAs
Things that were going well:
- All participants noted the simple and friendly nature of the app; all spoke positively of the amount of information the app gave them
- Users empathized with the intention behind recording donation activity
AFTER DOING USABILITY TESTS
Due to Usability tests, I implemented a number of key changes that are visible in the final prototype. Other changes that I didn't have a chance to get to are options for forthcoming higher-fidelity versions.
- I changed the weight and style of the Add Activity text, as well as its spacing. Increasing the weight and adding an underline made it more visible
- I changed the home page from listing food pantries around the country to listing food pantries nearest the user, with an optional filter to change the order of the list
- I moved the 'share on social media' icons to the screen after the user has already submitted their activity; test participants expressed that having them next to the 'submit activity' button was confusing.
Phase 4 • Deliver
Quick and friendly onboarding
Users instantly can access the search function of Plot Luck. Inside this feature, they can customize their search by filtering the results that are shown, thus prioritizing accuracy and user needs.
There are two animations in this flow; the first being that the sign up button spins when you click it, the second being that the flower shown on the last screen 'grows' to represent loading time.
I chose this sequence of screens for the sign up flow because when I conducted usability tests, users were not a fan of a long, overly thorough sign up process. These screens show a simple, minimal approach.
Share your activity with friends
When I ran the usability tests, participants had expressed that they would only be slightly willing to share their app activity on social media. When prompted to expand on that, I learned that strategically placing the prompts to share on social media could be used to encourage users to complete those actions.
I also wanted to offer the user adequate feedback on their actions, which would help ensure the app required low physical effort and had a high tolerance for error.
Personalized searches make use easy and intuitive
Navigation has been condensed to the floating icon in the bottom right. Users can complete most actions in one or two clicks.
CONCLUSION
I learned so much throughout this design sprint, and there is still so much I want to do to improve and build up Plot Luck.
Given more time, I would have spent a lot more time on user research. The timeline only allowed for a limited number of usability tests.
Despite my user research being limited, it was still incredibly valuable to the overall design. I feel that the questions and tasks I presented participants with during the tests gave me the information I needed.
Multiple times I had to tell myself that I wasn't done sketching yet and to not start wireframing. I don't need to fight myself on this - you can spend too much time sketching, but it's important to fully complete and reflect on a phase before moving to the next one.
