PROBLEM
A perennial issue with online grocery shopping is that the product the customer chooses first is not available and they would like to substitute it with something similar. When a product is not available during fulfillment, it creates an increased amount of friction on the personal shopper’s productivity. Each time an item is not available and the customer requests a “Best Comparable” product, the personal shopper, in most cases, needs to make a decision themselves or reach out to the customer to find the best replacement. Slowing everything down and placing strain on the stores to keep up.
RESEARCH
It was known that the substitution process was a challenge for both end-users and personal shoppers. The current flow was defined when Freshop was a start-up (pre-2021 acquisition by NCR) and did not have a defined UX Design team. I was “the team of one”. Its addition was created by Engineering to offer something to the stores on the platform. The team began looking at the competition to understand how they were handling it. Instacart, even though it is a marketplace eCommerce solution, has defined the expectation by online shoppers on this is handled. We have learned valuable insights by deconstructing how others handle this flow. What we found was that we can see the “Front-End” experience of the shopper but can not see how the fulfillment tool handles it. We also interviewed the engineer who was the architect of the solution to understanding what guardrails were present in creating a solution.
ROADMAP
This platform enhancement was elevated to the roadmap Q1-2022. Project, Engineering, and UX Design teams met to define what was possible leveraging the design systems patterns and components. The Product team wants to create an MVP to move this into production by end of Q1.
SOLUTION
With broad requirements, the UX Team set out to leverage the available patterns and components to create the UI. The framing of the problem that was presented was to reduce the cognitive load and offer fewer options with the ability to add a second choice product for the online shopper. This would streamline the fulfillment process. We also were aware of the technical considerations that leveraged the current platform so we could create the desired MVP by end of Q1.
The following prototype is how it will be presented on the front end of the platform. Flows/UI for the personal shopper tool are being generated and will be shared when the prototype is available.
WIP/Concept Version Prototype:
Product Manager Approved Version Prototype:
This solution will be what our Engineering Team will build out to create an MVP (minimum viable product). In addition, there is an AI component that is being developed to recommend similar products to the current item selected.