Oat Canada- Oat milk Product Research
Brand
Oat Canada
Year
2021
Role
UX Designer Intern
Timeline
5 weeks
Methods
Surveys, Journey Maps, Personas, Usability Testing
Tools
Figma, Google Form, Google spreadsheet
Project Overview
While the company is growing, the team decided to build up a solid UX foundation about customer insights, purchase journeys, etc. in order to develop strategies for the next steps.
*Due to NDA, this case study will only reflect a few aspects of my design process.
My Role
I worked on the research phase of this project as a UX Designer Intern and project lead at Oat Canada. I had an opportunities to experience research deliverables from planning to completion including surveys, persona, journey maps and usability testings.
Problem Statement
"Oat Canada has been growing and reaching hundreds locations in Canada, but the majority of users are not aware of the brand. Oat Canada has a desire to understand what the blockers are between them and customers in order to increase brand awareness."
Design Process
Interview
To have a basic knowledge of this industry and understand where we are, we prepared several topics that we wanted to learn more about the company in order to seek opportunities for them.
The intent of the interviews were to determine the following:
➕ Oat Canada's background story and company vision ;
➕ Current business models and strategies; and
➕ Oat Canada's upcoming plans in the next three months to half a year.
Session takeaways
From the conversation with Oat Canada's CEO and COO, we gathered key takeaways below:
➕ Oat milk product with two main features: zero sugar and higher protein
➕ Current target audiences are: Mothers; Intolerant to nuts and lactose; Having active lifestyle
➕ The company felt the invisible barrier between customers, and tried to understand the current market and users in order to break the gap.
➕ Priority Plans: Focusing on Canadian market; Improving brand awareness; Increasing available grocery locations
Competitor Analysis
Through this method, we not only gathered data and analyzed with criteria including JTBD, Heuristic Evaluation, target audience, etc. Additionally, we also analyzed the oat milk product review videos and Hotjar videos for the company website.
We got something here, but it's not enough…
Surveys
With all the assumptions in mind, we conducted surveys with two versions- online and in-store.
For the online version, we aimed to collect at least 50 respondents, and kept the questions concisely that can be completed within 5-10 minutes. We spread the link to many communities on different channels (e.g. Facebook groups, slack, Instagram, etc.)
The questions were focused on:
➕Have a sense of what plant-based milk is the most popular and why;
➕Have a general sentiment from the public about oat milk in general (and other oat-based products);
➕ Opinion on Oat Canada's and competitors' branding, packaging, product, etc.
On the other hand, we also created a concise script with 5 main questions for the in-store version. We chose one of Costco locations in the Toronto area, and asked 10 customers who picked alternative milk products about their in-store aisle experience and observed their behaviours.
User Insight
"Customers have a need to meet their requirements shortly either shop in stores or online because they already have certain predictions about oat milk products."
Personas & Problem Statements
Based on the analysis of the surveys, we created 4 personas with different problem statements below:
1. Family shoppers who have Costco membership are misled by the labeling on the display shelf because they don't have much time to read throughout the information on the packaging.
2. 20s individuals are looking for a beverage with better taste and natural nutrition because of their specific dietary requirements. This makes them very picky when it comes to choosing healthy food and beverages.
3. Consumers in their 30s have a strong motivation to buy versatile or sustainable beverages because they are worried and caring about the environment they love is broken down by global warming.
4. The 20s dairy milk shoppers with non allergy don’t have a stronger desire to purchase milk alternatives because dairy milk always has better deals than alternative milk.
Usability Testing
In this part, the team conducted the usability testing for Oat Canada's website and oat milk packaging. Based on the personas, we looked for 6 different types of milk consumers. Additionally, I created 3 tasks for packaging to understand their aisle experience and opinion on labeling.
Reflection & Learning
"Through this project, I learned that the huge value of the research had brought to the team in order to refine the products with practical solutions."
What I learned
✔️ I learned the possibilities of finding a way to reach our goal with limited budget and resources.
✔️ Compared to the website, the packaging part will need criteria or enclosed questions to help the data be organized in order to establish rationale for the next steps.
✔️ For the aisle experience, searching a way to simulate an in-store shopping environment will help the team to revealing more insights.
For the next steps, the team will create new wireframes, task flow and sketches according to the usability testing report. We believe that this research will help the team to design a better product that can reach more users and increase brand awareness.