Tackling the emerging threat of fast fashion, REYA is an online marketplace for sustainable fashion items from ethical brands and up-and-coming designers with sustainability in mind. The goal: To encourage conscious shopping & redefine the future of the fashion industry
Product Designer
Product Strategy
8 Weeks
Figma
Jessie Mahadumrongkul (Business)
Joy Leeswadtrakul (Developer)
Napat Kulruchakorn (Developer)
This started off as a hackathon project. The four of us competed in 'Hack For The People', an intercollegiate hackathon designed to engage students in tackling some of the worlds largest problems.
View our pitch deck: Here
🏆 We won a hackathon award
Results: We won a special hackathon award and will be incubating this idea with help from metaLAB (at) Harvard!
With the expansion of fast fashion, the industry has become the world’s second largest polluter.
People are noticing this problem and have turned to more sustainable fashion products. However, it is often very difficult to find these products since they are all over the place. Moreover, the public still lacks the understanding of the environmental harms of fast fashion and many ethical brands lack awareness in the market.
Thus, there is not yet a place that brings these shoppers and sellers together.
I've been trying to shop more ethically but it's hard to keep track of where I should/shouldn't shop from. You have to sift through all the marketing to find what’s truly sustainable."
- College Student (environmental advocate)
We work hard to source and produce sustainable products, but customers don’t seem to value my brand. It’s hard to compete with fast fashion brands.”
- Local Eco-Friendly Brand in Thailand
Our platform's objectives:
1. Encourage sustainable consumption by educating the market about environmental concerns of fast fashion.
2. Help customers find sustainable brands and products all in one place.
3. Help sellers expand customer base and reach the right target market.
I created two user personas based on the two main types of customers we will focus on.
Based on a user persona, I listed out the different stages users will interact with our platform and their overall journey. I also listed out several How might We questions, for each user’s stage, in order to help guide designs for the different pages.
1. Sell sustainable clothing items
2. Deliver a clear brand message and positioning
3. Inform customers about importance of sustainability
(customers should see the importance of sustainable fashion and why they should shop on our platform)
1. Design an effective & appealing homepage
• To make users understand our brand & objectives
• Engage users with attractive visuals
2. Clear website navigation
• To ensure seamless shopping experience and effective discovery / browsing experience
• Customers should be able to find what they want
• Include product search and filters to easily find products
3. Detailed product information
• To ensure proper selection
• Customers should also understand the sustainable impact of product
4. Seamless transaction process
• To ensure a high checkout rate and low cart abandonments
After finalizing our product's main goals, I created a site map to define the overall structure of the website. This was to give us a better understanding of the overall functionality and how a user might navigate through our website.
I created a user flow for a persona in order to create an experience that will be specific to users’ goals. This allowed me to focus on what pages / features are needed in order to accomplish the user’s goal. This also gave me a better understanding of the website’s overview and the things that should be included. Below, I mapped out all the possible paths the user can take.
Using the user flow as a guide, I created several of the site’s main screens as a low-fidelity prototype (sample screens shown below) to quickly explore several concepts for the website layout. I then tested this with 3 participants to validate whether these solutions addressed our goals.
• Our brand message was not clear in the homepage
• People could not distinguish our platform vs. other fashion platforms
• Unclear sustainable impact
• Key questions raised:
Since homepage is one of the most important pages and is the deciding factor whether users would start browsing our products, I conducted card sorting to find out what customers wanted to see most and what are the most important elements in an e-commerce landing page. Since it’s still COVID season, I had to conduct a virtual card sorting session using Optimal Sort and sent it out to 10 participants that included two types of our user persona.
(Closed and Open)
I created predetermined categories based on elements that would help our products meet our goals. But, I also allowed participants to add labels of other elements they would like to see on the homepage.
I asked the 10 participants to choose several cards and sort elements from things they want to see the most to the least.
I looked at the 'frequency' of elements participants chose and 'average position' of ranked elements. I decided to utilize horizontal spacing in the landing page to prioritize all 4 important elements to the users. Elements that had a chosen frequency of more than or equal to 5, had to be included in the homepage.
1. HMW make customers immediately understand that we sell sustainable & ethical clothing brands?
2. HMW entice visitors & drive them further down the conversion funnel?
• To make it easy for users to find what they're looking for, I focused on the navbar design.
• Hover over the main navigation menu to see subcategories to refine searches & for users to know the site's hierarchy
• Noticeable search bar - placed it prominently at the top of the page
• ‘Featured results’ on the right in dropdown menu, to increase engagement and enable users to discover interesting content
1. HMW help users understand product's sustainable practices & its impact on the environment?
2. HMW drive customers to continue to the purchase funnel seamlessly?
A few bullet points describe “what’s good” about the product displays on hover - Highlights important points and explains how product is sustainable / why you should buy it
Important Page Requirements
(based on research & user feedback)
Feature image
Gallery photos
CTA
Product Overview (title, price)
Product Description
Social proof (reviews, ratings)
Sustainability Information (impact)
1. How do we ensure high checkout rates & low cart abandonments?
2. Straightforward checkout process with clear steps that included: Delivery method, Shipping address, Billing address, Payment options, Summary, Checkout
🏆 We won a special award for the hackathon and will be incubating this idea with help from metaLAB (at) Harvard.
Next Steps
I will continue to get feedback and iterate on my designs. Due to the time constraint of the hackathon, there are still some pages that needs to be designed (brand listing page, sustainability index page, our blog). Our team will conduct a deeper research into sustainable and ethical fashion industry. I will also be exploring more possible features that can further differentiate us from normal clothing brands and motivate users to purchase on our platform.
Product Vision
Our vision is to be the largest global sustainability-focused marketplace. However, our baby steps to accomplish this vision is to launch our platform as soon as possible. Our development team is currently working towards the first production version. We will also launch a marketing campaign on social media channels with hopes to spread the words around sustainable fashion. Our partnership teams are reaching out to brands in Southeast Asia to onboard them onto our platform. By the time launch, we will have 10 partner brands as well as an established payment and delivery infrastructure.
View our business model: Here