UX/UI

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PLANET AID

planet aid

PROJECT

Design Sprint

TIMELINE

5 days

TEAM

3 people

TOOLS

Figma, Adobe Photoshop, Discord, Google Meets

In a team of three UX Designers, we conducted a thorough website review to identify user frustrations associated with clothing and textile donations. Recognizing the importance of reducing waste and aligning with Planet Aid's mission of making the world a better place, we designed a simplified flow that aimed to enhance users' experience throughout the donation process.

To ensure the effectiveness of our design, we conducted both primary and secondary research. In addition to analyzing existing data, we also conducted decontextualized interviews to gain valuable insights into users' frustrations related to accessing bin locations and donation information. By incorporating these findings into our work, we were able to create a user flow that provided a simple and streamlined path for users to access essential information such as best practices and bin/depot locations.

By enhancing the user journey, we sought to contribute to Planet Aid's mission and empower users to make a positive impact in reducing waste and promoting sustainability. Our collaborative effort and dedication to user-centered design resulted in a solution that significantly improved the overall experience of clothing and textile donations.

View Prototype

1

problem

Attitudes and lack of education towards consumerism and clothing donation contribute to why only 28% of people donate used clothing, which leads to increased textile waste.

2

Secondary research

The United States Environmental Protection Agency reports that Americans generate 16 million tons of textile waste a year.
Around 85% of all textiles throw away in the United States (roughly 13 million tonnes in 2017) are either dumped into a landfill or burned.

3

Reminder: What Planet Aid stands for

Planet Aid is a non-profit organization aiming to reduce CO2 emissions by providing a means for people to reuse and recycle clothing.
This reduces the need for manufacturing new clothes while also fighting the heavily polluting fashion industry, which uses large inputs of fossil fuel, water, fertilizer and pesticides to produce clothing fibers.
On average, Planet Aid collects and recycles over 90 million pounds of clothes every year.

4

Primary research

Using decontextualized interview methods along with recruiting from people we knew, five people were selected to interview from the simple criteria of those who have donated used clothing within the last year. We couldn't be too picky with our participants as we had just one day to construct a guide, find participants, conduct the interview and extract insights.

5

Interview insights

Bin accessbility

It's frustrating when you have to travel to a bin only to discover that it's overflowing and the area around it has become a dumping ground.

Donation information accessibility

Donors want to do more, but they don't know how. They want peace of mind that their clothing is going towards something useful or towards people who need them.

6

Current path

With the two major pain points in mind, we reviewed Planet Aid’s current website from the perspective of a potential Donor and found:

  • The donor is hit with an overwhelming amount of options on the home page.

  • The Find-A-Bin button is fairly visible.

  • However, the Find-A-Bin page takes you to an error page if a bin isn’t close by, blocking the user from even seeing a map for them to judge the distance themselves.

  • This would leave users feeling defeated, frustrated and even more overwhelmed.

7

Persona

8

User task flow

9

Sketching

We decided that all three of us should sketch two screens each for every step, which gave us a ton of options. Our 'Best Idea Wins' mentality pushed our solution to a great place and our collaboration was effective and enjoyable. We each presented our ideas over video and identified what we liked and disliked about each screen. We took it to voting, which we were confident would decide the best route forward for our product.

10

Initial wireframes + task flow

This flow was created to address the key insights discovered in our interviews in order to empower our persona Emily to have a better experience with donating clothes. Since she finds it difficult to access empty bins nearby, we expanded the map feature. We believe that users could see the status of a bins capacity in real time if a digital sensor was added.
Because our user’s journey ends at a donation bin and not our website, we found it necessary to provide a form of digital receipt that would be shareable across social media to provide her with a sense of accomplishment!

11

Testing insights

1. Planet Aids mission was unclear

Our users were unsure if they would feel compelled to begin the donation process without first knowing what Planet Aid was about.
Fix: Add a Mission/Values statement to Landing Page

2. Navigation was confusing

Some users were unclear on where certain buttons would be taking them.
Fix: Add more descriptive CTAs or add information beside existing ones.

3. Combine receipt + learn more page

Throughout our tests, users noted that it felt a little bit unnatural to be prompted to another page after the receipt page.
Fix: Combined both pages so that users who want to learn more can scroll, if they wish.

12

Prototype 2.0

View Prototype
My team and I finalized our prototype after receiving feedback from testing and produced a polished product we believe the Planet Aid team would leverage to meet their goals!

13

Next steps

While this project was just a five day sprint, thinking about the future is always important. We had some pretty innovative ideas that would get Planet Aid closer to their overarching goal of helping the world through reducing emissions by recycling and reusing clothing while providing humanitarian aid. It's a pretty awesome goal and we were excited to think of feasible ways they could do better work.

+ Bin QR codes for donation receipts

+ Develop 'Find a Location' (Input Address)

+ Expand the design of the Home Page

+ Implement a distant measurement for bins

+ Make 'Learn More' more interactive

14

Key learnings

As I reflect on this five day sprint, I can't help but think how fun it was to work on a project that helped the world. I rarely need extra motivation to produce good work, but providing a solution for a non-profit organization uncovered a new energy in my thinking. I'm committed to helping to the world become a better place and want to align myself with like minded people who are consciously looking for ways to develop.
Iterate!

While the three of us all had fairly good ideas of what each screen should look like, our pseudo-crazy 8s exercise elevated the final product as the best idea won.

Group cohesion.

Connecting with teammates is important. It creates trust, accountability, and a great environment to thrive in. Our intentions aligned well and we were able to handle any challenge thrown at us!

Details matter!

While I understand nothing can be perfect, details matter when you're advocating for a new idea or thought you're convinced will improve the product. Our presentation was sharp as we practiced professionalism.

WNBA
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