Overview
Role
I was the UX Designer for this project, coordinating with the Associate Category Manager for Apparel and the Director of Marketing at La Sportiva North America.
Background
La Sportiva is a global company that has designed, manufactured, and distributed technical mountain wear for more than 93 years. Their innovative products have been worn for some of the most notable feats in mountaineering history, including the first free ascent of the Dawn Wall, the first free solo of El Capitan, summits of Everest, and more.
Problem
La Sportiva continues to lead in innovation by designing more environmentally-friendly high performance gear and would like to explore a way to highlight these sustainable products on their website. They want to educate their customers on the brand’s significant efforts to reduce their environmental impact, as well as make it easier for customers to choose products that support their values.
Solution
Develop a multi-stage plan to add environmental responsibility content to the website. During a two-week sprint, I designed an initial minimum viable product (MVP) focused on enhancing the visibility and corresponding education of eco-details on the product page, as well as adding their eco-friendly product collection to the main navigation.
Research
For my initial research, I wanted to understand La Sportiva’s business goals and what other companies were doing to solve the problem. I also wanted to know if sustainable materials and production processes influence users’ purchase decisions and what initiatives are considered meaningful. Therefore, I used the following research methodologies:
Stakeholder Interviews
I interviewed the Associate Category Manager (ACM) of Apparel to learn about La Sportiva’s goals as a company, their goals regarding sustainability, and their current actions to support the environment. And while the brand’s key promise is high-performance gear, it’s clear that outdoor conservation is central to their user’s goal of outdoor recreation.
The ACM was extremely proud of new products, including a fully biodegradable jacket and t-shirts made from recycled plastic bottles. He made a point to emphasize those products/features to sales reps in national sales meetings; however, he believed the company could do more to promote those features to end user.
Secondary Research
I dedicated one day to secondary research to understand cultural trends, consumer sentiment, and competitor solutions.
User Survey
I initially planned to conduct 1:1 user interviews; however, after writing my script, I worried there might be a discrepancy between what users say about sustainability versus what they actually do. So, I quickly pivoted to a user survey in hopes that anonymity would lead to more accurate results. I screened for users that have made at least one outdoor gear purchase online in the past year and got responses from 13 people.
Define
User Personas
After synthesizing the results of my research, I developed a user persona with whom I could empathize when considering priorities and design decisions.
Project Goals
Once I conducted research with both the business and the users, I found it helpful to define where their goals overlap to maximize the impact of my proposed solutions.
How might we design a substantive, yet scannable way to help users choose more environmentally-friendly products?
Ideation
Primary Flow
Based on user research, I developed task flows to determine how Dakota might shop for gear that reduces environmental impact.
Feature Prioritization
I brainstormed a number of features that could be implemented to accomplish our shared business and user goals.
Proposing a multi-phase solution
Phase 1: For the initial MVP, we chose to focus on features that were quick to implement. This included adding a link in the main navigation to an existing, but poorly visible eco-collection. I also added an “Eco-friendly” product filter, whereas the company previously had lesser known eco-certifications listed as sub-filters under Materials and Technology. And lastly, I added icons on the product page, which explain the specific impacts on hover interactions.
Phase 2: Next, I proposed re-designing the Environmental Responsibility page to include interactive information/education on specific materials and processes. The icons from Phase 1 would link to this page those users looking for more details.
Phase 3: Lastly, for the highest impact, La Sportiva could rank all of their products based on sustainability and include a score on the product image and/or product details. This would create the most impact for the users, who really want to understand the relative impact of different products and struggle to understand the overall effect of multiple certifications. However, this would take significant resources to first assess the impact of each product and then design the content.
Design
Because I was working within an existing website and design system, I quickly explored ideas on paper before moving directly to designing a high-fidelity prototype for Phase 1 solutions.
Usability Testing
I recruited five users to test the desktop prototype, and prompted them to complete the following tasks:
Browse the men’s eco-friendly product collection (from the homepage)
View the product details for the Mood Hoody
Explore the Mood Hoody page to discover what eco-friendly materials and processes are used, and then add the product to cart
After the tasks were complete, users were asked which eco-friendly materials and processes were used to make the Mood Hoody.
Results
All 5 users were able to complete the tasks with 100% accuracy, and 80% of users were able to recall the correct eco-friendly materials and processes used. Because of the constraints of unmoderated testing, I didn’t receive much feedback from users to incorporate into future iterations.
Iterations
For Phase 1, I made two key iterations: updating the product filters to better match the existing functionality and reducing the size of the environmental impact icons on the product page.
In the second version, I kept the activity filter expanded until the user decides to close it. I also removed View All from the filter on the Eco-Friendly Collection page, since the results wouldn’t have changed anything.
The client felt the icons were too large and distracted from the ultimate goal of clicking Add to Cart. Because this feature was popular with users during testing, we agreed to keep the icons but reduce their size.
Conclusion
Final Thoughts
The final prototype allows La Sportiva to highlight their eco-friendly products, while taking steps to include specific environmental processes and context to their claims to help users achieve their goals.
Things I Learned
As a UX Designer, it is our job to advocate for the user, even if the client has different preferences. I found that deferring to research and testing while also explaining how such a small sample was still useful in UX led to helpful compromise.
Next Steps
La Sportiva North America will need to get the designs approved by headquarters in Italy before moving forward with developers.
Beyond the initial designs, proposed future solutions include re-designing the Environmental Responsibility page to include interactive information and relative impact of specific eco-friendly materials and processes.