User Research
Affinity Mapping
User Personas
Project Goals
User Flows
Branding
Wireframes
Get rid of what you don’t want and feel good about it.
Problem
Solution
Process
User Interviews + Affinity Mapping
You Donate
Schedule your donation and we’ll come pick-up your belongings
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We Recycle
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Your items will be sorted and recycled at our dedicated recycling facilities
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They Renew
Your favorite brands will give your items a new life.
Duration:
Dec 2023 - Feb 2024
Design Role:
End-to-end Product Designer, Research, Branding, Prototyping, Testing
Sector:
Nonprofit, sustainability, commerce
Good Trash - Designing a Pick-Up Donation Service
UI/UX Design
Branding
Case Study
By creating a stress-free and reliable donation process that empowers people to believe they can make a sustainable impact
By collaborating with other companies to encourage sustainable practices by upcycle your materials and giving them a new life through new products.
Good Trash helps you love the Earth a bit more
Interview Research Goals
Understand the types of moving situations people have experienced and what was the biggest stressor for them
Were there any external factors that affected your moving process? ie. job start date, lack of help from others, obligations
What kind of help do they wish they could have received?
People resort to throwing away a lot of their belongings when they have a short time frame to move, which leads to a lot of waste and a lot of guilt.
4 Participants
In-Person or Video Call
Process of Packing
Moving Distance
Types of Services Used
What took up most of their time?
What type of help did you receive?
Stressors
David
Jessica
Kaiwen
Anthony
Interview Participants
Key Insights
From the interviews with four participants, the following themes were identified in the affinity map below:
“I feel bad, but I have to throw it away”
Moving services are expensive! Users feel guilty about it, but they’d rather get rid of their belongings instead of hiring someone to come move them.
“Takes Forever!”
Getting rid of one’s belongings is the most time consuming part of the moving process.
“I have friends”
Why pay someone for their services when I can I can just rely on my friends and family? Users would prefer to ask people in their immediate circle for help than spend money.
“I don’t need anymore stress”
Dealing with administrative tasks is a big stressor because it is never a quick process when you have so many other things on your plate.
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2
3
4
Only pack what can fit in the car and get rid of anything that is non-essential
Motivations
Throwing things away is a last resort. She wants to try to sell or donate anything that is unwanted.
Start living a more minimalist life
She wants to start completely new in LA, which means bringing very little with her
Finds it important to be make environmentally conscious decisions
Doesn’t want to go through the hassle of coordinating movers
She only has 2 weeks to donate/sell everything
She needs to be at the office full time which will make scheduling time with buyers harder.
It is uncertain how long some items will take to sell.
Needs & Goals
Challenges
Age: 25
Occupation: Brand Manager
Location: California
Melissa Coles
“I’m really looking forward to having a fresh start. I’d want to start this new journey with more intention.”
Free-sprited
Unorganized
Passionate
Independent
Melissa is relocating to Los Angeles from San Francisco for a new job needs to move out of her apartment of four years. Her current job has been really tough on her and over the years she’s experienced a lot of burnout. She is looking forward to starting over again in LA with a better mindset on taking care of her herself. There is a lot that she has accumulated over the years in her apartment and she plans to pack only the essentials into her car. Melissa wants to implement more environmental practices in her move which includes donating or selling her items instead of throwing them all away.
Bio
User Persona
User Flows - Scheduling a Donation
Branding
Hi-fi Wireframes
Affinity Map
From my key insights, Melissa Coles was born. She represents many of us who are looking for a restart in life after experiencing burnout from work. Melissa is moving to a new city and wants to start completely new, which means bringing very little with her. She wants to make more environmentally conscious decisions and plans to donate or sell whatever she can before considering throwing her belongings away.
To make the donation process feel stress-free and rewarding, I worked on creating a linear user flow that narrows down the donation to three main tasks:
Donation Itemization
Scheduling a Pick-Up
Confirming + Collecting Rewards
What are the project goals for Good Trash?
Generate revenue from the distribution of recycled materials
Build robust partnerships with other companies to create innovative products
Help other companies adopt more sustainable practices in their business model
Reduce the amount of interaction needed between users and services to make it a stress free process
Convince users that sustainable practices can be accessible and convenient
Help users save time by eliminating the back and forth process of getting rid of unwanted belongings
Business Goals
How might we create more environmental awareness by developing an ecosystem around the user’s need to de-clutter in a simple and accessible way?
User Goals
From Melissa’s profile, I began to ask - what kind of company would support her needs?
Develop + Ideate
User decision points were added to consider questions users may have about the donation guidelines or additional items that may want to be added that are not listed by Good Trash.
Color palette
#899265
#EDEE97
#FCFBEC
#98AF86
#FFD6B9
#EB6608
#E2E5DE
#DEDDD0
#7A7A7A
Neutrals
Primary
Secondary
Flower like scribbles untangling itself represents decluttering/revitalizing
Font: Marko One
Weight: Regular
Playful green serif font that resembles Earth-loving 70s qualitites
The color palette is bright and lively with earth tones to represent the free-spirited and earth loving message of the brand
After several iterations of wireframes from sketches to mid-fi, a hi-fi prototype was created with the objective to have users be able to schedule a donation easily.
Usability Testing
Collaborative
Honest
Earth-Loving
Reliable
Spirited
Revitalizing
Good Trash
Good Trash Mood board
“Revitalizing” Colors
“Earth-Loving” brand Logo
Donation Itemization
Schedule a Pick-up + Confirmation
Confirmation
Donation Itemization
Schedule a Pick-Up
Rewards
Homepage
Test + Iterate
5 Participants
In-Person or Video Call
Avg. completion time - 7:00 Mins
Iterations
Particpants were asked to complete the donation tasks in the prototype using a list that I had asked them to write detailing all of the items they wish to donate
What Worked Well
Testing Details
“Seamless Task Flows”
The task of donating was logical and easy to understand for all users.
“Pleasant and friendly graphics”
Users liked that the color palette was warm and calming. They also liked the sketchy graphics that gave a friendly feel throughout.
“Rewards were exciting ”
Users were pleasantly surprised by the rewards and felt incentivized to become returning customers.
“Convenient process compared to others”
Users liked how quickly they could schedule a pick-up and not have to bring all their belongings to a donation center themselves.
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2
3
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Based on participant’s comments, a couple of changes were made to improve user understanding of the donation itemization and Good Trash branding.
Step-by-step donation explanation added
Update #1
Info button added to clarify what donation categories are
Update #2
Exact time updated to a 15-min window for more flexibility
Update #4
Sign-up Window added at confirmation so that users can save rewards and info.
Update #6
Users can make their edits and go straight back to the confirmation page
Update #5
Updated consistency of Other Items section to match above
Update #3
Homepage
Rewards
User’ reactions to this app have proven to me that there is a desire to incorporate sustainable practices. Supporting a company that is a proponent for environmental good is motivating for some people, while some just need the right incentives
Final Takeaway
Prototype
Usability Testing
Analysis
Iterate
Empathize + Define
Develop + Ideate
Test + Iterate