Stylink:
Seamless shopping experience that maximizes the traveler’s limited schedule
Date
August 2016 - December 2016
My Role
Product Design, UX Design
Team
Dido Rwaka - Marketing
Yanting Yao - Fashion Design
Adriana Ascanio - Fashion Design
August 2016 - December 2016
My Role
Product Design, UX Design
Team
Dido Rwaka - Marketing
Yanting Yao - Fashion Design
Adriana Ascanio - Fashion Design
Challenge + Approach
In my Creative Entrepreneurship course, my team noticed that shopping was a big part of the traveling experience for Chinese tourists and that Chinese tourists often were unable to purchase the products they wanted. By interviewing Chinese traveler shoppers, we learned that most tourists come to luxury stores to look for specific items. The driving force behind the trend of shopping in foreign countries and cities such as New York, London or Paris is due to the import duties and other taxes that add up to 60% on top of the original product’s price when purchased in China. However, more often than not, traveler shoppers find some difficulty in securing and purchasing their desired products in the alloted time that they have in their traveling schedule.
In my Creative Entrepreneurship course, my team noticed that shopping was a big part of the traveling experience for Chinese tourists and that Chinese tourists often were unable to purchase the products they wanted. By interviewing Chinese traveler shoppers, we learned that most tourists come to luxury stores to look for specific items. The driving force behind the trend of shopping in foreign countries and cities such as New York, London or Paris is due to the import duties and other taxes that add up to 60% on top of the original product’s price when purchased in China. However, more often than not, traveler shoppers find some difficulty in securing and purchasing their desired products in the alloted time that they have in their traveling schedule.
Process
User Interview
As the users and target audience of this product were specifically focused on traveler shoppers from Asia (especially China). We interviewed tourists in shopping districts in New York.
Interview questions probed at gaining a better understanding of the main frustrations within the shopping industry and the relationships people have with their sales associations.
1.
34 th Street, Macy’s, New York
34 th Street, Macy’s, New York
Mrs. Lee, 45 years old, from China
She came to New York for travel, this was her first time traveling abroad, and she said she also had some friends who were asking her to buy some things as a favor. She had a long shopping list, but she didn’t know where to find any items, or how she could manage to buy these within a few days.
2.
5th Ave, New York
5th Ave, New York
Mr. & Mrs. Chen, 42 and 40 years old, from China
Mr.Chen spoke some English, so he could use simple words to communicate with sales representatives. However, the item they had spent days looking for, was not in stock at the store they were at, and was only available at another store in Soho. Mr. Chen did not know where Soho was, how to get there, or that the Soho store was already closed.
3.
5th Ave, New York
5th Ave, New York
Miss Liu, 26 years old, from Chengdu, China
Miss Liu came to New York for the shopping and the food. As a foodie, she had many target places, restaurants that she wanted to visit, and a long shopping-list as well. She was in a Saint Laurent store on 5th Ave to purchase a particular bag that was only available in the Soho location. Her 6 pm restaurant reservation caused a schedule conflict for her, and she did not have extra time in her schedule to go out of her way again the next day. Even if she did, she wouldn’t have any guarentees that the item would still be in stock.
Research
We also researched the influence that Chinese shopping had on luxury fashion industry. NYC alone had 950,000 visitors from China in 2016 and Chinese tourists spent approximately $855,000 only in New York that year. Chinese shopping expenditure is growing larger than domestic shopping expenditure, and the luxury brand companies are already aware of the growing Chinese traveler shopper market. They are already looking for ways to improve the traveler shoppers’ shopping experience. Moreover, we interviewed salespeople in luxury boutiques in order to gain another perspective on difficulties with satisfying Chinese consumer demands.
Opportunity
After gathering all of our interviews and research, we found that traveler shoppers are having trouble with finding their products in a limited time and with the language barrier ruining their shopping experience. Also, sales associates wanted to improve their communication with Chinese customers since most of domestic shoppers use online instead of stores.
Why direct connection with the sales associates and not the brand?
In the interviews with the sales associates, we found that many stores had to turn away Chinese traveler-shoppers when the products they had brought pictures of, were not in stock.
Connecting the consumer directly to the sales associates on the floor ensures accurate communication of the availability of products in different locations. Even though some companies do have product locators, there is no universal platform for users to shop for different products from different brands and there is no guarentee that the stock lists are up to date, live. Connecting consumers to sales associates guarentees greater communication and better service rendered.
Solution
A platform where traveler shoppers can easily reserve luxury products for purchase before arriving in their destination countries and have a seamless experience with sales associate when purchasing their products.
After synthesizing our data and generating key insights into problems to solve, we decided that we wanted to address these three aspects with our product:
Personas
Scenario Walkthrough
Prototype Video