The solution
Being a team that wasn’t exclusivley UX Designers shaped how we mapped out our intented process before starting. We knew that there needed to be space and time for development as well as a full design process. This lead us to create a roadmap where we as product owners had to apply agile work methods.
Survey
We dove right in by first of all by exploring and expanding our understanding of how other brands communicate their sustainability stance and accomplishments. We chose these brands based on the teams own first instincts by asking ourselves "What brands/companies, scream sustainability when we think of them?". Here we needed to map out key insights in 3 categories. We chose the following;
1. Sustainability communication
2. End-user interaction
3. Ethics & company values
This research could then be quickly cross examined with what we've been presented with by Ricola, and contrasted with our own first assumptions around our client's communication.
We now knew that we had to adhere to these keywords:
We decided to go broad sending this survey out to as a wide of an audience as possible, not only Ricola's customers. Once we had the results we started organising the answers into categories such as quality, environmental and personal connection.
From our insights we could start taking the project into a new territory, personal connection and bonding. This survey helped us make the connection between digital spaces and human to human interactions. We had to find a way to bond with Ricola's consumers and employees, but this time in a digital space.
Interviews
From our survey we had a wide array of people that were available for further interviews. We chose these based on their unique perspectives they could provide
Young professional, Software Developer - Past consumer of Ricola
- Aid us in analysing the digital presence Ricola already had
- Deepen our understanding of a past Ricola consumer that didn't mark special interest in sustainability
University Student, Degree of Master in Strategic Urban Planning & in Climate Strategy
- Speak from a passionate sustainability perspective as consumer
- Critical and keen eye when digesting information regarding climate strategy
Representative from The Environmental Protection Agency & Blekinge County Politician
- Insight about the importance of company and agency transparency when communicating about sustainability
- Speak from a strict consumer perspective with special interest in regulation and reports
The main insights gathered from the Interviews was learning about how they digest information we’re given online. We saw a high degree of scepticism when observing their behaviour when interacting with companies via their online platform. Almost always feeling like something isn't being shown, or hiding behind a link embedded out of reach.
Ideation
Onwards to ideation! From here we wanted to explore as many different options and opportunities as we could, in a very short amount of time. This meant exercises such as brain-writing where we could build upon each other ideas and create visions of solutions we couldn't have seen on our own. We were sure we wanted to mainly explore the digital space of Ricola, but ideas outside of this scope still gave us new perspectives that we brought with us.
By using mind-mapping I could more fluently and easily present ideas to the team. This mind-map came to be our starting point of our final design. Combined with our insights we could highlight a few more points we wanted to hit with our design.
Prototyping
One of our biggest decisions we had to make when combining our own ideation and what we saw Ricola currently doing, in order to truly create a re-imagining. Are we going to work linearly or more towards a "choose your won adventure" direction?
We had to consider two types of consumers of information.
1. Only interested in some parts, and will skip past anything they don't care to consume
2. Wants a full and extensive picture of the bigger scope. If possible will willingly dive deeper and deeper making connections within a large body of information
We now turn to Figma where we could more thoroughly test our idea. Using the available tools to create a type of mapping. Here we could ensure that our page covered all necessary topics surrounding Ricola's sustainability goals and "footsteps". We also could create new topics that we found missing. Such as Transport of good on a local and global level. Sourcing of their products ingredients and so on.
The main goal was to create something that could in theory be never ending. Where the user could jump from topic to topic based on their relevance to each other. Ultimately creating a seamless loop that only ends once they've explored till their hearts content.
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