Pasta Evangelists
Introduction
UK subscription service Pasta Evangelists hoped to expand their business by improving the overall customer experience. They needed to address problems with the user account, as well as improving key e-commerce flows such as listings, subscription and the checkout.
I was hired to tackle these business goals, which were primarily aimed at maximising conversions, increasing order sizes and allowing users to more effectively manage their own accounts.
Over 5 months I researched, redesigned, tested, and delivered a new pasta shopping experience for their customers.
The redesign yielded the following results:
Team
Role:
Research, UX, UI, Usability Testing, Visual Design
Team:
1 Designer, 1 x Product Manager, Dev team
Time:
6 months
Business requirements
Pasta Evangelists were a relative newcomer to an intensely competitive, dynamic and rapidly evolving UK meal subscription scene, with a diverse range of companies vying for consumer attention.
Established players like HelloFresh and Gousto continue to innovate, offering flexible plans that allow customers to customise meals and adjust delivery schedules, reflecting a growing demand for convenience and personalisation.
Conducting an analysis involved identifying key competitors, evaluating subscription flexibility, assessing meal variety, studying delivery methods, and reviewing pricing and customer reviews.
This process provided insights into market trends and informed my ideation in the next stage.
I studied around 30 responses from a survey sent to existing Pasta Evangelists customers, asking them for their experiences with ordering recipes and managing their accounts. Some recurring issues became clear and gave me a good indication of where to focus my attention.
I studied around 30 responses from a survey sent to existing Pasta Evangelists customers, asking them for their experiences with ordering recipes and managing their accounts. Some recurring issues became clear and gave me a good indication of where to focus my attention.
After the research, I synthesised the insights I had gathered into an empathy map to provide insight into the customer's perspective, showcasing their challenges, frustrations, and positive experiences.
It helps in understanding their needs and emotions, allowing for targeted improvements to address their pain points and enhance their overall experience.
I created two personas to empathise with a broader range of customers' needs and perspectives, Bella and Quentin. Each persona represented a distinct variation of customer, helping me understand different behaviours, motivations, pain points, and aspirations.
With these personas as a guide, I created User Journey Maps that detail the experience of browsing pasta selection, creating an account, checking out, receiving the order, and then reviewing the food or managing the account.
To address some of the business goals and other issues uncovered by the user research, I posed some open-ended questions to colleagues as part of a brain storming session, in order to reframe the challenges and hopefully spark creative thinking.
To get a clear understanding of the steps involved in choosing recipes, subscriptions and paying, I put together a User Flow.
Account management necessitated many different task flows for the user, though most of these were fairly straightforward.
The account section quickly expanded in complexity as the various needs of customers and stakeholders were added to my list. This required a rethink of existing structure and an exercise in trying sort all of these elements into the most logical order.
I originally had a dashboard planned but this was replaced by ‘Upcoming Orders’ as the best choice for a home page.
Throughout this step of the process, I was sketching concepts for the recipe cards, check out flow and user account, so that ideas was not lost when it was finally time to do start some designing.
Early sketches and initial thoughts on the listings and setting subscription preferences.
Stakeholders were particularly keen to upsell Double Portions and so I looked at ways in which this could be encouraged.
Exploring navigation, UI for dietary preferences and different visual styles for the account section.
Testing
After completing high fidelity prototypes, I conducted usability tests with six customers. An additional two in-house volunteers were also used. They completed tasks such as ordering recipes, navigating checkout and managing the user account.
The product manager and I tested the design with users live, using a Figma link and Zoom.
Arguably the most important, this page needed to communicate the unique business model of the subscription service and the rotating weekly menu. The product cards also had to include the ‘Double Portion’ up-sell option.
A best practice checkout with minimal pain points. A particular challenge was to make clear that this was a recurring subscription, not a one-off purchase.
We managed to fit a lot of functionality into the new account section, enabling users to customise their subscription, see and change upcoming orders, personal details, and gain extra rewards by referring friends.
Outcome
The redesign yielded the following positive results:
