The challenge was to create a mobile application that helps in the collection of plastic/organic waste from a particular area/locality. There are a few organizations that collect plastic waste for free and make poly-fuel out of it which is then provided to the nearby villages at a very low price. The application helps the users in scheduling plastic waste pickups and communicating directly with the organizations responsible for collection. Users are also rewarded with redeemable points after a certain amount of plastic waste is collected from them. This is a small step towards making our planet free from plastic waste.

I did the Analysis wherein I worked on the Case Study, User Research, Market Research, and created Personas, Empathy Maps, and Customer Journey Map. I also worked on Low-Fidelity Wireframes, and Visual Design. 

Based on the interviews I shortlisted a couple of personas that suited best for my project. 

I referred to them throughout the entire product development process.

Through User Research, I developed personas. A couple of them had their own ventures that involved a lot of plastic. 

Sam is an architect with his own studio where a lot of people come and go to work.

Smitha runs a café that has a takeaway facility.

To understand how customers find and interact with the service I created a Customer Journey Map. Plastic waste packaging started to become a problem as soon as it started piling up in their cafes/ studios. It was imperative that the management of plastic had to be worked upon.  

The flowchart describes the user flow through the app by listing potential features users may interact with. 

When the users start the app, they will be led through a Sign In or Sign Up process before proceeding to the Home screen (dashboard).

The Home screen houses a header navbar with 3 options in the right corner:

Inbox— where users compose messages for communicating with the organization responsible for collecting plastic waste.

Calendar — where users can set reminders for events they create or they are a part of.

Rewards — where users see the rewards they have earned for their contribution to save the planet.

At the beginning of my design process, I created wireframes for testing purposes.

I started the design process with low- fidelity wireframes. This is the way I could iterate through many design options quickly.

I used Balsamiq, an invaluable tool for creating low- fidelity wireframes.

Before moving to the design of the product, I performed a testing round in order to reveal possible usability problems.

With the help of Balsamiq I created a low fidelity, clickable prototype. I tested this prototype with 4 users, two of them being the members of my family and the other two who were the target users. I did two iterations on the designs and validated my solutions with the target users.

The User Interface of Greenture is simple and intuitive. One can easily transition between the different features of this application.

During the brainstorm, I sketched a few shapes of the logo which would resemble a process of recycling and also depict the idea of caring for the environment.

The Greenture Logo resembles the shape of hands that protect mother earth which justifies the nature of the use of the application.

Once I tested out all usability mistakes, I started designing the final screens in Adobe XD.

Nature was my biggest inspiration in using this fresh visual style.

The users are from a varied age group, hence my aim was to keep it simple and clean.

I tried to focus on colors and visual elements that help in creating a feeling of a distinct brand in the users' minds.

Here's a small video of how the Greenture app exactly looks like!

Research and more research! It is very important to understand people who are actually going to use the application which also means you need to be thorough with the users' needs.

I really enjoyed working on this project, it helped me to learn more about the applications currently present in the market that are somewhat close to tackling such problems.