Reimagining the in-store POS experience for customers that remains in line with Lush's digital and moral ethics.

Role

UX Designer, Lead Narrative Architecht

Time

Part-Time (3 Days)

Category

UX Design, Hackathon, Cross-Departmental Collaboration, Agile Framework

Problem Space

Lush has a very strict code of ethics, and it's important to them that they stick to them. Their challenge they faced, was to better align their Point of Sale experience with their digital code of ethics.

Solution

Collaborating with fullstack developers and data scientists, we created a POS experience that celebrates the user's sustainabilty efforts with each purchase, and separates the gap between "shopping" and "checkout".

Key Findings

• 94% of younger customers will switch brands if they don't feel the current brand shares their values!
• Technical and Ethical constraints can beget really interesting features that solve pain points in unique ways.
• Pairing digital solutions with the environment they're in can lead to new ways to experience a brand.

Discover+Define

Discover + Define

A Point of Sale system aligned with Lush's Digital Ethics

Charitable contributions with purchases, cruelty free products, and being 10% employee owned since 2017 are some of the ways Lush has instilled their values into their business model. Now, Lush is looking to bring that to their Point of Sale system so that it is in line with their Code of Digital Ethics.

Goals

• Define "Point of Sale" within the context of Lush's digital ethics
• Collaborate cross-departmentally to produce a designed and devloped solution
• Present the solution and our collective narrative to various stakeholders 

How Might We (original)

How might we craft an open-source innovative shopping experience that adapts to the needs of an ever evolving market, while leading by eample with our digital ethics?

This How Might We was provided to our team from Lush, but through the process we refined it for our work.

Discover + Define

What even is a Point of Sale anyway?

We've all experienced a Point of Sale, but we thought it'd be good to fully define it not in it's purpose but as an experience:

A Point of Sale is the relationship between a customer and a business in which both parties agree to the terms of a sale.

In every good relationship, each partner has agency which is the difference between passive agreement, and enthusiastic approval. Before we could fully redefine the How Might We, we had to do some research.

Research with the Data Scientists

Through an agile framework the UX team and the Data Scientist team both went ahead to sought out more information.

• The UX team conducted interviews and a brief evaluation of Lush's current task flow from their app.
• The Data Scientists focused on finding quantitative data on Lush's digital ethics as a business model.

Data Scientist findings

1. 62% of consumers are attracted to companies that exhibit ethical values and consistency 
2. 91% of customers are more willing to switch brands that are more aligned with their values.
3. 94% of shoppers are loyal to companies that operate with transparency

UX Findings

1. People who shop at Lush love the experience within the store! The associates were always the highlight.
   
2. Associates are understood to be personable and knowledgeable. Some interviewee's did not want to talk to them as much, but understood them to be the above traits.
3. The only consistent pain point was the check out process (how serendipitous!)

Based off our research, we visualized the path that Lush's customers would take based on the way Lush does their business. This let's us know what our POS system needs. It has to be transparent, consistently ethical, and equitable.

Discover + Define

How Might We: Specified

So here is what we know:

• Lush's customers love the experience at Lush
• Customers are much more likely to keep shopping at businesses who share their values.
• Customers are incredibly willing to change the brands they shop at if they don't match their values.

This means our How Might We the team needs to ask has to address these issues. And so we went from:

How Might We (original)

How might we craft an open-source innovative shopping experience that adapts to the needs of an ever evolving market, while leading by eample with our digital ethics?

How Might We (Redefined)

How might we create an in-store shopping experience that is an extension of Lush's values so that users can shop barrier free and celebrated?

Meet Natasha!

We took our data from interviews and created Natasha as a means to best understand our user's journey to solve that How Might We. Our solution should prioritize Natasha's desire for a clear and uninterupted experience, while also satisfying the core concept of the Lush's transaction and ethical constraints.

What does Natasha Need?

• A full experience that does not isolate during check out.
• Validation that her values are "our" values.
• Clear comunication about what she's supposed to do.

Discover + Define

Mobile App as a vehicle

Our team felt strongly that this solution should be on a mobile device. Natasha needs validation and communication while checking out her goods, and she already goes to her phone to get both of those things, so it should translate well. Although setting off confetti to celebrate each customers purchase sounds nice, it seems a little wasteful (also against Lush's values!)

We did a quick evaluation of their current app and learned a few things:

• Lush Lens is a propietary technology that can actually scan a product in-store and get information about price, maker, etc.
• The app does not support in-store purchases, but only to ship orders to you.

There is an opportunity to personalize the landing page for the specific user.

Lots of real estate here to play with the POS experience. How does a purchase contribute to Lush's values?

During this transaction, I wonder how we can celebrate the user?

This is the profile page, but doesn't give any information that might help our problem. How can we integrate a profile and landing page?

Develop+Design

Develop + Design

Key Features

Our features needed to solve Natasha's pain points she had, so did we do it?

Shopping with the Lush Lens

Pain Point

Natasha feels that the checkout process is isolated from the shopping experience.

Solution

We optimized the Lush Lens, which originally only pulled information about the product, to now also add to cart. Associcates, who she enjoys speaking to, will gather her items when she's ready to check out, and can tap to pay on devices the associates will walk around with.

Your Personal Impact

Pain Point

Natasha doesn't like when the companies she shops at don't share her values.

Solution

Based on the research the data team discovered, we knew that the loyalty and consistency of customers was dependent on companies transparency of values. Because of this, we included a feature that would track the customer's contribution to sustainable efforts with every purchase at Lush's stores.

Final Insights

Final Insights

Key Learnings

Working across departments within an agile framework highlighted a couple of remarkable insights.

Agile Framework is the way

Everyone was always working on something. By defining our MVP early on the process, the developers got to build out the checkout system, the data scientists sought our data on Lush's sustainability efforts, and the UX team created the look and user task flow. Each person conducted hand offs to the point person on each team, and we met daily to ensure we were on the same page.

Communication is also the way

Just like in life, it's important to communicate any and all needs. Our friends in development and data science did not know in detail what the "How Might We" was, just like we as the UX team didn't instantly know what "open source code" was. Communicating needs gets everyone on the same page!

Next Steps

Field Tests

Our next steps should Lush choose to implement this solution would be to test this user flow out in the field! Because the Lush Lens is a current feature within the app, our team wasn't as concerned with rigorous user testing. Our answers to fine tuning this solution would come from testing within the experience!

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