Description: 

Starting in the summer of 2018, myself and four other UW students all joined together to pursue our entrepreneurial passions and create a company: F(x) Haircare. The goal of this project was to go through the entire process of starting a company from ideation, research, prototyping, testing, manufacturing, marketing, selling, and finally exiting the market.

Phase 1: Ideation

When we first went to the drawing board, we had ideas that spanned across a variety of industries and with varying levels of complexity. However, we finally decided to focus on self-care as we knew that was a very important area for college students- who were our main target demographic. We also brainstormed the values and image that we wanted our company to stand for. Our values being to focus on providing a high quality and sustainable solutions to the community.

Phase 2: Research

After narrowing our focus down, we researched different types of products. We had to look at not only how well the product would be received, but also how feasible production and distribution were. We surveyed over 50 students, by reaching out to different student-run organizations on campus, to collect insight into what their needs were in terms of self-care. We ultimately found that beauty and in particular, haircare was an area that had not been sufficiently addressed in the market. Our next steps were to research the different types of haircare products and how to recreate a formula for them. In the end we came to the conclusion to create an all-natural, scented hair oil. We used only all-natural ingredients because quality and sustainability were important to us. We decided to add scents to our hair oils because one of the findings from our research was that current hair oils or similar products smelled distinctly medicinal or just not very favorable.

Phase 3: Prototyping & Testing

First, we experimented with different ingredients and ratios based off our research findings of most common ingredients used in in-store products. We compared our product with the ones on the shelves and refined our formula through test trials with both female and male users. We had users split into different groups to test different formulas. We gave the users a small bottle and basic instructions on how to use it, and had them log their thoughts of the product. After two weeks, we interviewed the users about their experience and found out what they liked/disliked about the product.

With our base formula ready, we then began running a focus group with 20 students (female and male) to test different scents. Finally, finalizing our scents and formula, we ran another focus group dedicated to branding.

Phase 4: Manufacturing, Marketing, Selling

After finalizing our formula, scents, and brand image we started our next phase. We pushed hard to launch a pre-sale before the holiday season. During our pre-sale our goal was just to gain traction via social media and word of mouth. After the holiday season, we continued to expand our reach by contacting nearby college campuses to sell our product. We created a website to enable customers not directly on the UW campus to learn about us and to order from.

Final Product:

Our final product was a hair oil that came in two scents:

• f(1) - lavender and vanilla

• f(2) - cedarwood and vanilla

What I Learned:

This whole project was a great learning opportunity and helped reaffirm my passion for entrepreneurship. There were many things we didn’t know how to do, so we had to research, experiment, and continue to refine our thoughts. For example, after our pre-sale, we raised our prices too high. Although our price was still much lower than our competitors in the stores, we lost sight of our customers: the price-sensitive college student. After observing a slowdown in sales, we evaluated our business model and decided to lower the price to the pre-sale price.

Overall, this was one of the best experiences I have had in college. I had the chance to collaborate with an interdisciplinary team and take on many different roles. A big thanks to my teammates for making this possible!

Description

The original form of this project was completed over the course of nine weeks as part of an undergraduate course at the University of Washington in the Winter of 2019. I worked with a team to research and develop the idea, but I was responsible for the design, wireframe, and prototype.

The Challenge

Each year, approximately 6.5 million adoptable pets enter animal shelters in the United States, while only 3.2 million animals are actually adopted. Currently, 1.5 million shelter animals are euthanized every year because there are not enough adopters. So, the problem we tried to solve was: how can we connect pet shelters with potential pet owners to help increase the adoption of pets and decrease the capacity strain on pet shelters?

The Solution

Allow potential pet owners to find a matched pet from nearby pet shelters to adopt. There are two users of our app, and both have distinctly different user experiences:

1. Potential Pet Owners

2. Pet Shelter Admins

From our research we made the following assumptions:

• Adopting a pet has historically been a timely process, and solely through in-person interactions, so both pet shelters and potential pet owners want a way to speed it up and communicate more effectively.

• Pet Shelters filter out adoption applications based on the paperwork a potential owner files, but still require the final decision to be made in-person to observe the pet and the owner.

• The information about the pets would be similar to the information already available on a pet shelters website. This reduces the amount of extra work that pet shelter admins would need to complete.

• There are popular characteristics that owners will look for in pets. They will want a pet that will complement their lifestyle. For example, if they live an active life, they are more likely to want a pet they can walk with outdoors.

Assumptions:

From our research we made the following assumptions

• Adopting a pet has historically been a timely process, and solely through in-person interactions, so both pet shelters and potential pet owners want a way to speed it up and communicate more effectively.

• Pet Shelters filter out adoption applications based on the paperwork a potential owner files, but still require the final decision to be made in-person to observe the pet and the owner.

• The information about the pets would be similar to the information already available on a pet shelters website. This reduces the amount of extra work that pet shelter admins would need to complete.

• There are popular characteristics that owners will look for in pets. They will want a pet that will complement their lifestyle. For example, if they live an active life, they are more likely to want a pet they can walk with outdoors.

Key Features:

Our app is similar in concept to other matching apps. The users (potential pet owners) are shown matches based on the selected criteria and are given the chance to “heart” a pet and schedule an appointment with them. Additionally, we wanted to make sure to focus on quality versus quantity matches. Thus, we provided a match percentage to show how closely the pet and pet owner’s criteria was matched.

We decided to allowed pet shelters and pet owners to review each other after an appointment. The main objective of this is to allow pet shelters to flag pet owners for suspicious behaviors so other shelters would know. For pet owners, they can review the pet shelter on the process of adoption (i.e. ease of the process, care of the pets, etc).

One of the main reported complaint areas for pet owners to-be in looking for a pet to adopt is that the process with the shelter takes a long time. Shelters have to manage many pets, many appointments, and keep track of a lot of paperwork. Therefore, we give potential pet owners the option to fill out a in-depth questionnaire, which is based on the paperwork they need to fill out in order to start the adoption application process. With this information, shelters can make a more informed judgement on whether to offer the pet owner an appointment to reduce the amount of time wasted from unproductive appointments.

We also wanted to continue to engage users after they adopted a pet, so we included a promotions feature that would prompt them to keep using the app. This would allow local pet stores and related services to provide promotions and coupons to the new pet owners to promote their business. This also allows new pet owners the ability to stock up on all the supplies they will need to care for their new pet.

The Challenge:

I decided to take part in the May 2019 Adobe XD Creative Challenge. For nine days, participants are given a challenge to create a stand alone experience that collectively helps build the major sections of a multi-surface movie app.

Key Feature:

My main focus of the design was to create an easier way to search for movies. From my conversations with other users, and my own experience, I found that searching for new titles by genre is not very intuitive in current video entertainment apps. It’s often a function that is tucked away. Therefore, I utilized the users’ natural tendency to want to interact and swipe with their mobile device to highlight this search ability. Users can swipe to the right to view more category options. Once they find one that intrigues them, they simply tap on it and their search results are filtered by that category.