Digital Line Busting — Hank Trefethen

workshop Facilitation, study design, Generative Research, evaluative Research, interaction Design, visual design, Prototyping, animation

SITUATION

At peak times the take-a-number approach grew to feel DMV-esque. Waning patience, traffic jams, and certain product inaccessible. This retail group knew it could do better and wanted to leverage technology to improve the in-store shopping experience.

HYPOTHESIS

I observed and interviewed shoppers during peaks and valleys to see for myself where a solution could be triangulated amongst shopper’s pain and delight, and business objectives. My hypothesis was that breaking up the traffic would allow customers to kill time by continuing to shop. Two birds, stone.

SOLUTION

The easy answer here was to upgrade the take a ticket approach to a digital line-busting system where shoppers could check-in and get texted when their name was next in line. The system is a well-choreographed experience across 4 screens, 5 if you include the shopper’s phone.

Check-in Kiosk: Shoppers checked in at kiosks near the cut counter and then be free to continue to browse, on busy days shoppers would check-in, shop ‘til called and proceed to cut and purchase without any need to kill time. — **Check-in Kiosk:** Shoppers checked in at kiosks near the cut counter and then be free to continue to browse, on busy days shoppers would check-in, shop ‘til called and proceed to cut and purchase without any need to kill time.

Jumbotron: As soon as a shopper signed in, they’d be added to the queue in a friendly, delightful, and easy to see manner. When it was their turn their name and desk assignment would be in lights. This provided a warm and clear direction while givin… — **Jumbotron:** As soon as a shopper signed in, they’d be added to the queue in a friendly, delightful, and easy to see manner. When it was their turn their name and desk assignment would be in lights. This provided a warm and clear direction while giving shoppers a sense of pace as they moved closer to the horizon.

Team member app: Those working the cut bar would be able to progress shoppers through the queue and push announcements to the Jumbotron above. Additionally, all job aids were digitized, always up to date, and no longer cluttering their workspace. — **Team member app:** Those working the cut bar would be able to progress shoppers through the queue and push announcements to the Jumbotron above. Additionally, all job aids were digitized, always up to date, and no longer cluttering their workspace.

Admin and reporting site: Corporate and store leadership are now able to monitor service times, consume reports and push live updates to any part of the experience by individual store and system-wide. — **Admin and reporting site:** Corporate and store leadership are now able to monitor service times, consume reports and push live updates to any part of the experience by individual store and system-wide.

Micro Interactions:

To increase the quality and warmth of the human computer interactions, these micro interactions were defined for specific operations within the apps.

Removing a Customer From the Queue: If a customer needs to be removed from the queue, a team member will simply tap on a name then tap "remove" to update the the queue. — **Removing a Customer From the Queue:** If a customer needs to be removed from the queue, a team member will simply tap on a name then tap "remove" to update the the queue.

Filtering the profanities: JoAnn is a family friendly organization who provides a ponies, puppy dogs, and rainbows level creative experience where expletives would definitely poison the well. I therefore designed an experience that would deter would… — **Filtering the profanities:** JoAnn is a family friendly organization who provides a ponies, puppy dogs, and rainbows level creative experience where expletives would definitely poison the well. I therefore designed an experience that would deter would be pranksters (and typo makers) from the satisfaction of trolling the patrons.

Skip limit reached Sending folks off to shop after they’ve signed in at the cut bar opens up a greater chance that they’ll not be around when their name is called or better yet decide to continue shopping for more merch. If they don’t show up after … — **Skip limit reached** Sending folks off to shop after they’ve signed in at the cut bar opens up a greater chance that they’ll not be around when their name is called or better yet decide to continue shopping for more merch. If they don’t show up after they’re notified the first time, they’ll drop a slot or two in the queue, after that happens 3 times there’s a 91% probability they’ve left the premises. In this instance we ask the team member to double check their presence before removing them.

RESULTS

Joann wanted to increase the quality of experience for it’s customers, and our design proved to be very effective. Traffic was busted, team members reported a marked improvement in the level of service they could provide, shoppers moved freely throughout the store, and store sales went up 4%.