UPZY
A Digital Thrift Store for Kid’s Clothes
The Challenge:
Children outgrow their clothing so quickly that keeping up with their wardrobe can be both time-consuming and costly. Most existing thrift apps are geared toward adult clothing, leaving a gap for parents seeking affordable, stylish options for their kids.
The Goal:
The goal of this project is to help parents save both time and money by creating a centralized platform where they can effortlessly buy and sell second-hand children's clothing at affordable prices.
Project Overview
Role: UX Designer
Tools: Figma, Google Forms (for surveys), Paper Wireframing
Duration: July- November 2024
Problem Statement: Parents and caretakers often struggle to find an affordable, convenient way to buy and sell secondhand children’s clothing. Many existing platforms lack a tailored experience for kids’ items.
Solution: UPZY is a mobile app designed to simplify the process of buying and selling pre-loved kids’ clothes, making it easier for parents to save money while shopping sustainably.
The Design Process
Empathize
Understanding users' needs, emotions, and challenges through research to create meaningful, user-centered solutions.
Define
Analyzing research insights to clearly identify the problem, ensuring the design solution directly addresses users' needs.
Ideate
Brainstorming and exploring creative solutions to address the defined problem, focusing on innovation and user needs.
Iterate
Prototype
Creating interactive models or mockups of a solution to test ideas, gather feedback, and refine the design before development.
Iterate
Test
Evaluating prototypes with users, gathering feedback, and making improvements to ensure the final product meets their needs effectively.
Empathize & Define
Research & Analysis
User Research- Survey
I performed user research by creating a survey in Google Forms and sending it to 6 users in the target audience. The survey posed questions going into depth about their experience purchasing clothing for their children.
Key Questions
What is your primary method of finding clothes for your children?
What concerns do you have when shopping for clothing for your children?
What is your primary method of disposing of clothes that your children no longer wear?
What I found- user pain points:
The evolution of consumer behavior
Every participant said that their primary method of shopping for their child is online. Meaning they are unlikely to shop at in-person thrift stores.
The expense of e-commerce
Cost was listed as the primary concern when online shopping for children. In addition, children grow out of clothes too quickly to be spending high.
Donating out of convenience
Most participants revealed that they are donating their used children’s clothing when they could be selling them for a profit.
Cost as the number one concern
Regardless of shopping method, parents revealed that cost is the biggest factor that they consider when clothing shopping for their children.
User Personas
User personas help keep design focused on real people, not just assumptions. By creating a profile based on actual research, I am better able to understand user needs, behaviors, and frustrations—leading to more intuitive and user-friendly experiences.
Meet Rachael!
Competitive Audit
By looking at competitors’ strengths and weaknesses, I can create designs that stand out, solve user pain points better, and offer a more unique and user-friendly experience. It’s all about learning from the market to make smarter design decisions!
Ideate
Brainstorming
How Might We?
"How Might We" (HMW) is a problem-framing technique used to turn challenges into opportunities for innovation. It helps me brainstorm creative solutions by reframing user problems as open-ended questions.
How might we make selling kids' clothing effortless for busy parents?
Parents often donate instead of selling because listing items takes too much time.
Possible solutions: AI-powered listing assistance, bulk upload features.
How might we create a shopping experience that feels affordable and trustworthy?
Buyers may feel online resale is too expensive or worry about item quality.
Possible solutions: Transparent pricing tools, buyer protection policies, price filters or verified seller badges.
How might we build a strong community that keeps buyers and sellers engaged?
Many resale platforms feel transactional rather than community-driven.
Possible solutions: A parent-focused forum, reward programs, or seller follow/favorite features.
User Flow
My next step was to block out the user flow throughout the website. This helps improve usability and gives me a clear user flow to track through the site.
Paper Wireframing
My first step in designing the site is paper wireframing. This is a low cost way for me to rapidly try out as many ideas as possible by exploring layouts, testing different structures, and iterate rapidly without getting caught up in details. By focusing on the overall user flow and key elements, it helps me identify potential issues early in the design process and select key elements I would like to use in my later designs.
Digital Wireframes
Digital wireframes take rough ideas and turn them into something more structured and interactive. They’re all about laying out content, navigation, and functionality without worrying about colors or visuals yet. Using Figma, they make it easy to tweak and test layouts before going too deep into the design. It’s a simple but super important step to make sure everything flows smoothly before adding the final details!
Prototype
Connecting
Mockups
Mockups bring designs to life by adding visuals, colors, typography, and branding to wireframes. They’re the first look at how a final product will actually feel, making it easier to spot design issues before development. This step is all about refining details, making sure everything looks cohesive, and ensuring the design is both functional and visually appealing.
Prototypes
Prototypes take designs a step further by making them interactive, letting me test how everything flows before it’s fully built. They help me see if the user experience feels smooth, catch any problem areas, and get real feedback from users. I use prototypes to bring ideas to life, whether it’s a simple clickable wireframe or a more polished version of the final design. It’s all about refining and improving before anything goes live!
Testing
Usability Studies
Moderated Usability Study
I ran two usability studies to see how real users interacted with my designs. The first study, after the lo-fi prototype, helped me catch early usability issues and refine the overall flow. The second study, after the hi-fi prototype, focused on the details, making sure the experience felt smooth and intuitive. Both studies gave me valuable insights that shaped the final design, helping me create a product that truly works for users.
On average, how long is a person spending in the app from start to finish?
What percentage of users are completing the process of checkout when using?
How would you compare the use of this app to shopping in stores for your children?
Is there anything that the majority of users are having a hard time locating while in the app?
Is this something that users can see themselves using in their day to day lives?
Research Questions
Moderated usability study with 5 participants taking place the week of October 6-12.
Data will be collected by audio and video recording. My own observations will be recorded on sticky notes during the interview.
Data will be analyzed using an affinity diagram.
Methodology
Participants will be people who have children in their lives who they may shop for, primarily children or grandchildren.
Participants do not need to be the parents of young children, just have young children in their lives who they are close to.
3 male, 2 female, ages 20-70.
No users of assistive technologies. Find one?
Incentive: Meal provided.
Participants
Time on Task
Conversion Rate
Syste Usability Scale
Key Performance Indicators
Script and Findings
Prompt
Can you access your shopping cart where you previously added the item and complete the checkout process, please?
Follow-up 1: Is the checkout process easy or hard to complete?
Follow-up 2: Was anything unclear during that process?
If you were to list an item to sell, what would you do?
Follow-up 1: Try it now, please.
Follow-up 2: Did you find anything confusing?
Would you please attempt to navigate back to the homepage from wherever you are in the app?
Follow-up 1: Is it clear how to get back to the homepage?
Follow-up 2: What would you change about this process if you could?
Could you picture yourself using this app in your day to day life?
Follow-up 1: Do you feel that it would save you time and money?
Follow-up 2: Is there anything that you would change about the app to make it more effective in your life?
Search for an item in the app and find one you would like to select, how would you add that to your shopping cart?
Follow-up 1: How easy was it to search for an item?
Follow-up 2: Now how would you go about accessing your shopping cart to check out?
Round 1 Findings
Majority of users preferred to see a home button on the bottom of the page
Most Users had a hard time finding the page for selling clothing items
A few users thought that the home page was too busy for a mobile app
Round 2 Findings
Most users felt that there should be more information included on the confirmation page
A few users thought that there should be images on the search page
Majority of users felt deceived that there was not prices listed on the images
Iteration is a huge part of my design process because no design is perfect on the first try. Testing and feedback always reveal ways to make things better, whether it’s tweaking a layout, adjusting a flow, or reworking a feature to be more user-friendly. Each round of changes gets the design closer to something that actually works for real people.
Iterations
Most of my iterations consisted of adding more information so that my user did not feel deceived by the site. More transparency with your users = a more user friendly design
Thank you for your time. Please don’t hesitate to reach out to me about reviewing more of my work.