Project Overview
City Sprouts is a social enterprise started in April 2019, inspiring communities to connect to food and their community and build a more sustainable society through sprouting green spaces and programs.
For our first student group project at General Assembly, we were tasked to redesign the website of City Sprouts.
Duration
October 2022
(5 Weeks)
People
Team project: Rachel (me),
Xiu Hui, and Chloe
Skills
User Research, Prototyping, User Testing
Tools
Pencil and paper and Figma
Problem
Singapore imports more than 90 per cent of our food. The aim is to increase local production to achieve a "30 by 30" goal: to build up our agri-food industry's capability and capacity to produce 30% of our nutritional needs locally and sustainably by 2030, up from less than 10% today.
​
Insights from our User research revealed a lack of awareness of food sustainability in Singapore, and most users could not tell that City Sprouts is a social enterprise.
Solution
Our team has decided to redesign the City Sprouts website to increase awareness of the benefits of locally produced food and the social/environmental impact of food sustainability.
​
Critical features of City Sprouts include:
Revamped Home Page
The new home page has summary information about City Sprouts and the services provided.
Engaging Storytelling
A short animation slideshow will help to spread awareness about the impact of the food situation in Singapore.
Interactive Information about benefits of food sustainability in Singapore
An interactive scroll effect will help to keep the users' attention.
​
The information is given in a short summary for better memory retention and less chance of users skipping text.
Mascot Element
A 'baby face' mascot helped to gain users' trust and increase user engagement when the text is 'spoken' to them instead of just written as a chunk of text.
Process
Our team has decided to do market research on food sustainability in Singapore.
We discovered that Singapore imports more than 90 per cent of our food. The aim is to increase local production to achieve a "30 by 30" goal: to build up our agri-food industry's capability and capacity to produce 30% of our nutritional needs locally and sustainably by 2030, up from less than 10% today.
We also conducted user interviews to understand better their perception of food sustainability and usability testing for the existing City Sprouts website.
​Insights from our User research revealed a lack of awareness of food sustainability in Singapore, and most users could not tell that City Sprouts is a social enterprise.
​
Competitive Analysis
Our team has conducted a competitive analysis of NGOs in Singapore and globally to understand how the storytelling has been structured on the platform.
Competitive Analysis Findings
OPPORTUNITY #1
Implementing interactive storytelling elements for "About Us"
The competitors of City Sprouts have a storytelling element. This feature is essential because it is crucial to let the users know how City Sprouts has started. This is an opportunity for us to implement this feature for our users.
OPPORTUNITY #2
Showing the impact of why advocating the cause is important
We realised that City Sprouts is currently lacking in spreading awareness of the impact of food sustainability in Singapore.
User Research
To revamp the web page better, we first need to understand users’ attitudes toward food sustainability and Social Enterprise in Singapore. We also conducted usability testing of the existing web page for the users. Each of us has conducted three user interviews.
Findings from the User Interviews
INTERVIEW INSIGHT #1
Users think that a social enterprise website should be educational
Users expect Social Enterprise websites to provide educational content that helps them to understand why they should support the cause.
INTERVIEW INSIGHT #2
Users think that a social enterprise website should promote its branding and products effectively to consumers
Users expect Social Enterprise websites to effectively promote their branding, product and services provided for them because they are interested in learning what's in it and the story and values behind the brand.
INTERVIEW INSIGHT #3
Users feel that a specific targeted group is interested in food sustainability/growing their food
A few users are interested in food sustainability and growing their own food. They are motivated by a desire to adopt more sustainable and healthy lifestyles and see growing their own food as a way to achieve these goals.
INTERVIEW INSIGHT #4
Users think there must be more awareness of the benefits
of locally produced food
Users believe there must be more awareness of the benefits of locally produced food. They are interested in supporting local farmers and businesses, believing that locally produced food is fresher, healthier, and more sustainable than food shipped from other countries.
Refining Our Users
With our findings, we defined two target group profiles, Anderson—a 25-year-old Software Engineer and Joanne—a 27-year-old Graphic Designer, to better empathise with our main user groups and prioritise goals according to their needs and pain points.
Ideation
In this process, we went through several rounds of rapid sketches creating ideas on paper quickly to ideate solutions using the "crazy 8" method.
​
Userflow
Next, we drew a user flow for Joanne and Anderson on the FigJam to ensure that it aligns with their needs and goals.
​
Wireframe
High-fidelity Prototyping
Once we finalised the wireframes, we produced a high-fidelity prototype. We used Figma to create its flow and the interaction
User Testing
With the high-fidelity prototype, we conducted usability testing on six participants. The objective is to test the following:
-
If the participants can take away some knowledge about food sustainability after visiting the website​
-
If the participants are keen to take action to support food sustainability
efforts in Singapore -
If the participants understand the goals and motivations of City Sprouts
as a social enterprise -
If the participants can book City Sprout's workshops easily without any errors
User Testing Results
The participants can complete most tasks and feel they are well aware of the food sustainability situation in Singapore. They can play a part just by supporting the local farmers.
USER TESTING RESULT #1
Participants can identify that City Sprouts is a website promoting food sustainability by conducting workshops and renting green spaces/plots
They recognised that the website offers workshops and rents green spaces/plots and saw these services as promoting sustainable and healthy food practices.
USER TESTING RESULT #2
Participants can locate the “Education” page and learn more about Singapore’s food sustainability efforts
Participants can locate the "Education" page on the website and learn more about Singapore's food sustainability efforts. They recognised the importance of education in promoting the efforts made by the Singapore government and appreciated the information on the website.
USER TESTING RESULT #3
Participants can book the workshops easily without any errors
However, some participants expressed that they did not know the buddy system, there was no back button on the workshop information page, and they were unsure if they had reached the end of the main workshop page. I also noticed that none of them has utilised the calendar function.
Iterations
Based on the user testing results, we made a few adjustments to improve the final prototype for City Sprouts.
ITERATION #1
Usability Issue 1.1
The design for the animated slide show was iterated by adding the "Next" and the close button so that users would not miss out on the information about food sustainability.
Before
After
ITERATION #2
Usability Issue 1.2
The style of the button was changed to make it more obvious that it was clickable.
Before
After
ITERATION #3
Revamped UI of the Events & Workshop
The page number is added inside so the user will know if they have reached the end of the main workshop page. The calendar function was removed as most users never used the feature. It was replaced with a breadcrumbs feature so users could go back and forth on the page.
Before
After
ITERATION #4
Additional information for the buddy system
The information about the buddy system is added to the workshop information page. So that users will be able to access the information easily in case they do not know how the buddy system works.
Before
After
Reflection
I love this project because I get to work with my classmates. The topic of the project is interesting because we get to learn what food sustainability is. All of us had zero knowledge about food sustainability. One of the main challenges was trying to understand the topic better and getting a misconception that NGOs and Social Enterprises are the same.
I'm glad we (the team) could communicate with one another because this is something I value the most, as my current job involves lots of communication. I also feel that as a UX Designer, doing research is essential because it's the key to solving the root of the problem.
