Savory Spice Shop was founded in Denver by Mike and Janet Johnston in 2004. The first location was a rousing success and soon after a website was created to allow more people to experience the Savory Spice Shop difference online.
Simplify the primary navigation and reduce the amount of textual content. Highlight medicinal properties and product sourcing information.
User Research, Information Architect, Wireframing, UI Design, Usability Testing, Prototype Design, prepared slide deck and presented the case study.
A Savory Spice Shop retail site was just down the street and that allowed me to observe and interview actual clients,explore the store and speak with the staff. In addition to client information provided by the staff, the "Spice Merchants" also described the types of online users as well. Online orders are actually filled by the staff so they are very familiar with buying habits and online user issues. The information gathered from the observations and interviews identified three groups of users and I used those to construct personas.
"Our shoppers love the ambiance and personal attention when visiting the shop" - Rebecca, a Spice Merchant
Interviewing Spice Merchants and observing in-store customers provided three distinct user profiles.
A 32 year old mother of two who enjoys preparing meals for her family on a regular or daily basis. Grew up in a family where cooking was a tradition and she wants to pass that on to her children.
Someone whose professional career depends on the ability to repeatedly create engaging dining experiences on a daily basis for a large number of discerning guests.
A twenty something whose close friends are getting married on a frequent basis and who she wants to purchase unique and personable gifts for that will be well received.
Based on my user research and the personas I started sketching some ideas.
Based on some early feedback from my sketches I created low fidelity wireframes to validate user workflows and functionality.
A low fidelity wireframe of the home page.
I completed two rounds of usability testing and applied the feedback that I had received. Below is a high fidelity version of the new home page.
The Savory Spice Shop redesign was hard given the time frame but it was a great learning experience. I don't have a lot of experience with e-commerce websites so it made it just a bit more challenging. The feedback I received from stakeholders was that I met the stated objectives and therefore the project was successful. In hindsight I would have spent more time in the analysis and ideation phase of the design.
E-commerce sites are challenging, site navigation and managing data is critical for a positive and engaging user experience. Given more time I would have liked to explore more of the mobile version of the site.
