An 18+weeks remote group project to explore the future of physical-digital shopping at farmers' markets. Fava connects a younger generation of casual farmers' market shoppers to local vendors via recipes to let them know where to buy the seasonal food, and how to use them. For the scope of this project, we focused on creating the shoppers' views of the experience.
Product lead
Art Director
Researcher
Storytelling-Motion Design
2020 summer
Rachel Denoble
Veronica Wojnas
Jean He
Advised by Deloitte-Doblin
Figma/ Adobe XD/ Illustrator / Photoshop / After Effects
How to create a physical-digital experience for Farmers' Markets to attract more potential millennials and Gen-Z casual shoppers to shop more at farmers' markets by providing farmers stories, seasonal products information, and recipes under COVID.
The Casual Shopper is someone who visits once a month for a fun experience. They seek out organic food or specialty retailers. Due to COVID, they have to cook at home more than ever. So, they need to rethink where they buy their food.
What do Casual Shoppers need for an informative and pleasurable famers' markets shopping journey during COVID?
Onboarding based on values
When a user first opens Fava, they go through a short onboarding sequence to inform more personalized recommendations.
Our research showed that casual shoppers connect their market trips to their personal values and aspirations (ex. supporting local business, buying sustainable products, eating organic food)
Informative ordering experience
Beyond regular online shopping, Fava also gives the shopper opportunities to understand more about the farmers' markets' in seasonal products and farmers' stories.
80% of users voiced that they don't know why the price is so high when they go to a farmers' market. Understanding all of the work and care that vendors put into their products helps to rationalize why some prices may be higher than mass-produced supermarket products. This context comes alive in the vendor profile.
Maintain a sense of fun and discovery while waiting in line
Due to the unique physical market shopping characteristic, Fava gives a balance between online shopping and market pickup within an informative and efficient physical-digital experience.
Farmers' markets, like many public spaces in the pandemic, must regulate capacity to abide by social-distance guidelines. Signs show around the market that shopping must be limited to 10 minutes or less to keep the lines moving. Fava's My Order tab streamlines the pickup experience to help the user get in and out quickly.
Be part of shoppers' lives
In additional market maps, Fava also calculates a pickup route to streamline the at-market journey along with the after-market shopping plan.
90% of users say they liked the way to embed FM's trip with other shopping plans.
While farmers’ markets have continued to grow in the last 10 years, the growth has slowed down substantially; as of 2019, there are more than 8,800 in the U.S.
While farmers' markets have continued to grow in the last 10 years, the growth has slowed down substantially; as of 2019, there are more than 8,800 in the U.S.
COVID-19 has dramatically affected market operations, markets had long entry lines, shoppers were asked to shop in 10 minutes or less, and samples are prohibited. These restrictions deterred casual shoppers from visiting and supporting markets during the pandemic.
Contextual Research
We researched the history of Seattle's farmers' markets and nationwide trends in farmers' market shopping.
6 SME Interview
We wanted to learn how farmers markets fit into the Seattle community and what's involved in purtting on the markets.
10 Customer Interviews
We learned about shoppers’ attitudes, behaviors, motivations, and expectations for shopping at the farmers market.
5 Vendor Interviews
We came to understand the life and struggles of being a vendor in the farmers' markets during COVID.
This is a fully remote research process via virtual meetings
Casual shoppers tend to combine going to the Farmers' Market with another activity, whether on purpose or by chance.
Shoppers who value (or claim to value) things like local, sustainable, ethical, or organic products shop at the farmers market to affirm their values internally or project them externally.
Shoppers have some openness to exploring the market and trying new things. They are encouraged when they try samples, receive guidance or recommendations from vendors on unfamiliar products, or see posts on social media.
Both sides seek a certain level of interaction at the market, but neither wants to make the first move. Products make great icebreakers and continue to be the focal point of relationships between vendors and customers.
This system would allow vendors to share the whole story. Our response lets vendors share the whole story.
Enhance the connection between shoppers and vendors in-person and continue to foster them when they're online.
Encourage shoppers to try new things and build new connections in the market and the surrounding community.
Motivates users to build a habit and intention of going to the market by drawing on these positive feelings and highlighting the shared benefits.
Used Miro to share and cluster our ideas. Dot-voted for the concepts that aligned with our design challenge and design principles.
Collaborated with different farmers' market managers to better understand essential user flows and critical market needs and constraints.
Using Figma and Google Slides, we created low to high fidelity prototypes and tested them with 10+ potential customers to validate the concept.
Version 1.0 - Before
After presenting version 1.0 to our potential users, we found that although it works as a flow, it has some issues.
"It just looks like another random app, I can't relate it to fresh and tasty food." -- P11
Version 2.0 - After
I created a more holistic user experience to achieve the goal of increasing brand value to attract more younger random shoppers.
Version 1.0 --> Version 2.0
"Although I feel good to support farmers' markets, I still need information such as the price and image of the products." --P9
Version 1.0 --> Version 2.0
"Why do I have to to next page to check items availability of market?" --P9
Version 1.0 --> Version 2.0
The new version will list a plan with an order list at the farmers' market and the shopping list within other ingredients from a linear vendor by the vendor confirmation process. The primary purpose is to accelerate shopping for our target audience.
Version 1.0 --> Version 2.0
By analyzing other competitors on the market, Fava is looking to focus on shopping and vendor connection.
Due to COVID19 lockdowns, more people are cooking at home. By using Fava, users can get a 3-in-1 experience with local farmers' markets ingredients, customized shopping lists, and integrated recipe instructions.
Fava suggests Market Matches, which are recommendations for local farmers market vendors who have the seasonal items needed from the user’s recipe. Market Matches narrow down vendors based on product availability and value alignment to make a choice easier.
The vendor profile has helpful information about products and highlights the people and stories behind them. Understanding all of the work and care that vendors put into their products helps rationalize why some prices may be higher than mass-produced supermarket products.
Shoppers are prompted to add a Market Mystery Pick to their order at the end of the ordering flow. This promotion aims to help introduce small or new vendors to shoppers and benefit users' special deals.
We realized we could capitalize on the time shoppers spend waiting in line by adding a way for them to discover other vendors or additional market offerings.
If users want to visit vendors they found during the discovery phase mentioned above, they can pin vendors to their pickup route for an efficient and safe trip for COVID-time and even beyond.
By showing the order pass to vendors for pickup orders, shoppers and vendors could quickly check their lists and create a connection with potential sales and services such as recall, promotion, and contact.
Fava also plays a role as a to-do shopping list for casual shoppers. A customizable shopping list allows the shopper to shop for farmers' markets with other places habitually.
The attributes of Fava visual are Bold, Retro, and Crafts. By calling back the old retro styles with a new digital touch.
1. Food traceability will be a huge part of shopping, food recalling, and safety checking.
Without a doubt, I will continue to build a food traceability system in Fava. By scanning a QR code on each package, shoppers could easily understand how the products have been grown.
2. Flush out vendor-side of the system.
For the scope of this project, we focused on the shopper’s view of the Fava experience. However, in the next phase we need to work on designing the vendor’s side of the experience.
3. Business collaboration with market organizations.
Collaborate with farmers' markets organizations to build out the whole eco-system, not only the direct-to-shoppers stage but also restaurant supply chain, go-to school program, CSA, etc
4. Change the stereotype of shopping at farmers markets.
Currently, from our research, we learned that many people have a bias towards/against shopping at farmers market. I am hopping that this product could also provide more touch points to change people's old-school opinions of farmers markets.
