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CityLift
An innovative app for college students to buy, sell, and transport used furnitures when moving
My Role:
UX Designer, Prototype Developer
Duration:
7 weeks
Tools:
Figma, Miro, Mural, Adobe PS
What's CityLift?
Concept Statement:
CityLift is an innovative app designed for college students to buy, sell, and transport used furniture. Featuring a shareable pushcart system, it connects buyers and sellers within the college community, making furniture transactions and moving convenient, affordable, and efficient.
Target Users:
College students residing away from home often face frustration when seeking affordable furniture, particularly in urban areas where the cost of living is high.
CityLift is an innovative app designed for college students to buy, sell, and transport used furniture. Featuring a shareable pushcart system, it connects buyers and sellers within the college community, making furniture transactions and moving convenient, affordable, and efficient.
Target Users:
College students residing away from home often face frustration when seeking affordable furniture, particularly in urban areas where the cost of living is high.
Double Diamond Approach
In this project, we decided to take the Double Diamond approach to ensure a comprehensive exploration of user needs and iterative design refinement, in order to effectively address the unique challenges college students face in urban furniture transactions.
Double Diamond Approach
1. Discover
🎈 Educated assumptions
🎈 Observations
🎈 Preliminary research
🎈 Mind Mapping
🎈 Observations
🎈 Preliminary research
🎈 Mind Mapping
Assumptions
Before landing on the concept, we initiated the discovery phase by identifying potential pain points for urban young generation as they start living away from home. We made several educated assumptions:
- Lack of Transportation: Many students do not have access to personal vehicles, making it challenging to move large furniture items.
- Storage Problems: Students often face issues with storing furniture temporarily when moving between apartments or dorms.
- High Moving Costs: Students face high costs when hiring moving services or renting vehicles for transporting furniture.
Survey
We conducted an online survey and received 83 valid responses. The data confirmed our assumptions:
57 respondents indicated that transporting large and heavy items is the most challenging aspect of moving in NYC, while 39 respondents identified finding affordable furniture as a major difficulty.
57 respondents indicated that transporting large and heavy items is the most challenging aspect of moving in NYC, while 39 respondents identified finding affordable furniture as a major difficulty.
Moving in NYC
Which of the following aspects did you find the most challenging while moving in NYC? (Select all that apply)
Interview
After extensive discussions and interviews, our team also identified a substantial demand for affordable furniture among college students living in New York City. This presents a significant market opportunity for us to capitalize on.
Cindy
Junior studying at SVA
"Transporting affordable furniture becomes a puzzle - you've got the deal, but how do you get it home without breaking the bank?"
Nick
Freshman studying at NYU Stern
"Affordable furniture is often a game of compromises. You might find a great deal, but then the challenge is making it work with your overall vision."
Jenny
Senior studying at CUNY Baruch
"The challenge is not just in finding the right price tag but also in ensuring the furniture survives the journey from the store to your home."
2 - Define
📌 Narrow down target users
📌 Scope the problem
📌 Market research
📌 Ideate solutions
📌 Scope the problem
📌 Market research
📌 Ideate solutions
Problem Statement
After the research, we decided to narrow down our target users to focus on college students.
How might we make it easier for college students to buy, sell, and transport affordable furniture in NYC?
How might we make it easier for college students to buy, sell, and transport affordable furniture in NYC?
Market Research
To design a service that helps college students quickly access and transport furniture in the city, we conducted in-depth market and competitor analysis. The key competitors we identified include the Facebook Marketplace, Craiglist, Nextdoor, Charish and Move Loot.
Based on our research, college students prefer pre-owned furniture from fellow students over strangers on Facebook Marketplace, highlighting trust as a crucial motivator for choosing our app. The table below compares the UI, audience, primary use case, transaction process, market presence, challenges, and opportunities of these services.
Based on our research, college students prefer pre-owned furniture from fellow students over strangers on Facebook Marketplace, highlighting trust as a crucial motivator for choosing our app. The table below compares the UI, audience, primary use case, transaction process, market presence, challenges, and opportunities of these services.
User Case
We also created a persona to represent our primary target users and identified their potential touch points with our concept.
Persona: Alex
Alex has just moved into a new apartment and is excited to settle in. However, he is frustrated to discover that there is no chair or desk in the apartment. Searching online, he is shocked by the high prices of new furniture. He then starts considering used furniture and discovers our product, CityLift, which offers an affordable and convenient solution for his needs.
Persona: Alex
Alex has just moved into a new apartment and is excited to settle in. However, he is frustrated to discover that there is no chair or desk in the apartment. Searching online, he is shocked by the high prices of new furniture. He then starts considering used furniture and discovers our product, CityLift, which offers an affordable and convenient solution for his needs.
ABOUT
The About page is the core description of your website. Here is where you let clients know what your website is about. You can edit all of this text and replace it with what you want to write. For example you can let them know how long you have been in business, what makes your company special, what are its core values and more.
Edit your About page from the Pages tab by clicking the edit button.
Edit your About page from the Pages tab by clicking the edit button.
ABOUT
The About page is the core description of your website. Here is where you let clients know what your website is about. You can edit all of this text and replace it with what you want to write. For example you can let them know how long you have been in business, what makes your company special, what are its core values and more.
Edit your About page from the Pages tab by clicking the edit button.
Edit your About page from the Pages tab by clicking the edit button.
Ideation & Prioritization
Since the concept of a shareable pushcart has the highest effectiveness and requires the least time to MVP according to the prioritization matrix, we’ve decided to include the pushcart idea as one of the key features in our mobile app that aims to connect buyers and sellers.
3 - Develop
🎨 Pushcart station ideation
🎨 Mobile app feature ideation
🎨 Mobile app interface design
🎨 Mobile app feature ideation
🎨 Mobile app interface design
Mash-up Innovation
We gained inspiration through the Mash-up technique. Similar to how the drive-in theater combines the concepts of a movie theater with a parking lot, our team came up with an idea of sharable pushcart by combining concepts of CITI bike, airport luggage carts, and TooGoodtoGo map together.
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Introducing CityLift
• Easy Setup: With a quick onboarding, this app can be used by both buyers and sellers.
• Quick Switching: Users can explore free furniture from nearby neighbors and switch between buyer and seller by simply switching the toggle on the home page once they sign up.
• Flexible options: Depending on the distance, people can choose from Pickup or Delivery on the product details page.
• Accessible Map: Allows users to quickly identify the nearest push cart stations anytime, anywhere in NYC.
• Quick Switching: Users can explore free furniture from nearby neighbors and switch between buyer and seller by simply switching the toggle on the home page once they sign up.
• Flexible options: Depending on the distance, people can choose from Pickup or Delivery on the product details page.
• Accessible Map: Allows users to quickly identify the nearest push cart stations anytime, anywhere in NYC.
Low-fi Sketches
Starting with low-fidelity sketches, I came up with the main features and designed the main user flows. Here's the earliest iteration of the app.
After talking to our friends and some students at NYU, we found that a chat feature for buyers and sellers to communicate is expected and desired by our potential users.
After talking to our friends and some students at NYU, we found that a chat feature for buyers and sellers to communicate is expected and desired by our potential users.
Mid-fi Wireframe
I then took a further step to develop the sketches into a mid-fidelity wireframe that better represented the user’s flow and navigation within the app. Here are some sample screens:
4 - Deliver
🤖 Hi-fi prototype handoffs
🤖 Pushcart station mockup
🤖 Market strategy planning
🤖 Pushcart station mockup
🤖 Market strategy planning
Hi-fi Prototype
Here are some sample screens from my high-fidelity prototype. Users can select whether they want to be a seller or buyer and switch thei role anytime on the home page.
From the home page, they can choose from several categories and select multiple categories simultaneously.
From the home page, they can choose from several categories and select multiple categories simultaneously.
Pushcart Station Mockup
A place for you to borrow and return push carts anytime, anywhere, to transport furniture in New York City.
Below are mockups I’ve made to illustrate the design concepts we are envisioning:
Below are mockups I’ve made to illustrate the design concepts we are envisioning:
Future Steps
In terms of our next steps, we aim to gather additional insights from more college communities in NYC to further validate our concept and ensure it remains feasible, desirable, and viable.
The following are the steps we plan to implement:
The following are the steps we plan to implement:
- Improve push cart infrastructure: by providing additional types of push carts
- Incorporate AR (augmented reality) technology: to enhance the visualizations of furniture
- Expand user bases: by introducing CityLift to other communities
- Collaborate with the city officials: to add more CityLift stations across the five boroughs
- Form Partnerships: with other businesses and non-profit organizations
- Test and Iterate: to refine the product
