UI/UX
asya
Online Asian supermarket project
Australia is a multicultural country, with over 17% of the population of Asian descent. While online grocery shopping is booming, mainstream platforms often fail to meet Asian users’ needs for authenticity, language support, and delivery reliability.
Year :
2025
Industry :
Retail
Project Duration :
10 weeks
Problem :
As an Asian designer living abroad, I personally experienced the frustration of poor UX and limited access to authentic food. This project is my response—to explore how culturally aware, user-centered design can improve everyday shopping for underserved communities.
Desktop Research :
According to my desktop research: There are many differences between people with Asian background who live in Australia and mainstream local consumers (mainstream Australian consumers) in their daily shopping.
Asian and local Australian User Behavior Differences:
Product Preferences: Asians focus on rice, sauces, tofu, and seasonal specialties; locals prefer pasta, bread, and salad items.
Shopping Frequency: Asians shop more frequently (2–4x/week) and prefer planned, batch purchasing.
Decision-Making: Asian families often shop for the whole household, valuing familiar brands; locals shop individually and prioritize price.
UX Expectations: Asians expect Chinese-language support, cultural relevance, and personalized suggestions; locals expect fast search and clean UI.
Holiday Products: Local apps support Western holidays; Asian shoppers expect items for Lunar New Year, Mid-Autumn, etc.
These behavioral and cultural differences suggest the need for tailored UX approaches in search, categorization, and product presentation.
user Interviews :
After completing desktop research, I wanted to go beyond numbers and understand how real users think and feel when shopping for Asian groceries in Australia.
The goal was to uncover:
Why users still prefer offline shopping despite poor experiences
What emotional or practical barriers stop them from using online platforms
What they value most in the shopping journey
What I Found
Despite being dissatisfied with offline stores, none of the participants had ever used an online Asian supermarket.
Their reasons revealed a deep trust gap and usability issues:
🥦 Control matters: Users want to select fresh items themselves and don’t trust staff to pick for them.
🚚 Delivery concerns: High delivery fees, slow shipping, and lack of tracking cause frustration.
🔍 Poor navigation: Hard-to-find categories and limited search options reduce efficiency.
💳 Cultural mismatch: Many apps lack bilingual support and familiar payment options like Alipay or WeChat Pay.
💬 Missing social proof: No user reviews or recommendations make it hard to build confidence.
Empathy map :
User Empathy Map & Design Insights
To address the pain points faced by the Asian community in Australia while shopping at Asian supermarkets, I conducted interviews with 7 users and created an empathy map to better understand their thoughts, feelings, and behaviors.
What was done
Collected insights through user interviews, focusing on emotional barriers and pain points such as concerns about product quality, delivery times, and payment methods.
Visualized these insights with an empathy map, guiding the team to focus on user needs and driving design iterations.
Key Takeaways
Defined design directions, particularly in improving navigation, product selection, personalized recommendations, and delivery tracking.
Gained a deeper understanding of the cultural differences within the target user group (especially the Asian community), providing strong user context for subsequent designs.
This process allowed us to pinpoint the core user pain points and optimize the shopping experience, creating a more culturally relevant e-commerce platform for the Asian community.
Persona :
What was done
Created a detailed persona for Annie, a 27-year-old programmer living in Sydney, who faces frustrations with offline shopping due to crowded stores and product availability.
Focused on understanding her core needs: better product navigation, personalized recommendations, and fast, trackable delivery.
Key Takeaways
Identified Annie’s key motivations: convenience, product selection, and fast delivery.
Highlighted the importance of a seamless online shopping experience that meets both functional and emotional needs.
Used this persona to guide the design of a more user-centered platform, ensuring it aligns with Annie’s expectations and pain points.
pain points :
What was done
Through user interviews and research, we identified key pain points related to both offline and online shopping experiences in Asian supermarkets.
Focused on challenges like limited product variety, poor navigation, long delivery times, and the lack of control over product selection.
Key Takeaways
Offline Pain Points: Stores are overcrowded, poorly organized, and lack variety, making shopping difficult.
Online Pain Points: Users struggle with unclear navigation, limited product selection, unreliable delivery times, and lack of product tracking.
These insights helped us understand the critical areas to improve for a better user experience.
Journey map :
To understand the full shopping experience, we mapped out the journey of our target users, focusing on both their online and offline shopping behaviors at Asian supermarkets.
Through this process, we identified key moments in the shopping flow, from product discovery to delivery. We highlighted emotional ups and downs, including the excitement of finding the right product and the frustration with delivery delays or unclear tracking.
Key pain points surfaced in areas like product navigation, where users struggled with finding and comparing items, and the lack of clear delivery timelines. These insights have given us a focused direction for improving the shopping experience—especially in simplifying navigation, providing clearer delivery tracking, and giving users more control over their selections.
WireFrame:
To design a seamless user experience, we created a wireflow to map out key user interactions within the app. This wireflow visually represents the user journey through the platform, highlighting each screen and interaction step.
We focused on simplifying the flow, ensuring that users can easily navigate through the product search, comparison, and checkout processes. The wireflow also included key decision points, such as selecting payment methods and choosing delivery options, to ensure a smooth and intuitive flow.
The result was a clear, actionable blueprint that streamlined the user experience, making it easier for users to move from one step to the next without confusion or frustration.
Low-fidelity:
We developed a low-fidelity prototype to quickly test and validate the basic structure and flow of the app. This early-stage design focused on layout, navigation, and core functionality without detailed visuals or interactive elements.
The goal was to ensure that the overall user journey was intuitive and that key features—such as product search, filtering, and checkout—were easy to use and logically connected. By keeping the prototype simple, we could gather quick feedback and iterate on the design without investing too much time in high-fidelity details.
The feedback from testing helped us identify areas for improvement, especially around navigation clarity and the flow between screens, leading to a more refined design in the next iteration.
Mood board:
High-fidelity :
More Projects
UI/UX
asya
Online Asian supermarket project
Australia is a multicultural country, with over 17% of the population of Asian descent. While online grocery shopping is booming, mainstream platforms often fail to meet Asian users’ needs for authenticity, language support, and delivery reliability.
Year :
2025
Industry :
Retail
Project Duration :
10 weeks
Problem :
As an Asian designer living abroad, I personally experienced the frustration of poor UX and limited access to authentic food. This project is my response—to explore how culturally aware, user-centered design can improve everyday shopping for underserved communities.
Desktop Research :
According to my desktop research: There are many differences between people with Asian background who live in Australia and mainstream local consumers (mainstream Australian consumers) in their daily shopping.
Asian and local Australian User Behavior Differences:
Product Preferences: Asians focus on rice, sauces, tofu, and seasonal specialties; locals prefer pasta, bread, and salad items.
Shopping Frequency: Asians shop more frequently (2–4x/week) and prefer planned, batch purchasing.
Decision-Making: Asian families often shop for the whole household, valuing familiar brands; locals shop individually and prioritize price.
UX Expectations: Asians expect Chinese-language support, cultural relevance, and personalized suggestions; locals expect fast search and clean UI.
Holiday Products: Local apps support Western holidays; Asian shoppers expect items for Lunar New Year, Mid-Autumn, etc.
These behavioral and cultural differences suggest the need for tailored UX approaches in search, categorization, and product presentation.
user Interviews :
After completing desktop research, I wanted to go beyond numbers and understand how real users think and feel when shopping for Asian groceries in Australia.
The goal was to uncover:
Why users still prefer offline shopping despite poor experiences
What emotional or practical barriers stop them from using online platforms
What they value most in the shopping journey
What I Found
Despite being dissatisfied with offline stores, none of the participants had ever used an online Asian supermarket.
Their reasons revealed a deep trust gap and usability issues:
🥦 Control matters: Users want to select fresh items themselves and don’t trust staff to pick for them.
🚚 Delivery concerns: High delivery fees, slow shipping, and lack of tracking cause frustration.
🔍 Poor navigation: Hard-to-find categories and limited search options reduce efficiency.
💳 Cultural mismatch: Many apps lack bilingual support and familiar payment options like Alipay or WeChat Pay.
💬 Missing social proof: No user reviews or recommendations make it hard to build confidence.
Empathy map :
User Empathy Map & Design Insights
To address the pain points faced by the Asian community in Australia while shopping at Asian supermarkets, I conducted interviews with 7 users and created an empathy map to better understand their thoughts, feelings, and behaviors.
What was done
Collected insights through user interviews, focusing on emotional barriers and pain points such as concerns about product quality, delivery times, and payment methods.
Visualized these insights with an empathy map, guiding the team to focus on user needs and driving design iterations.
Key Takeaways
Defined design directions, particularly in improving navigation, product selection, personalized recommendations, and delivery tracking.
Gained a deeper understanding of the cultural differences within the target user group (especially the Asian community), providing strong user context for subsequent designs.
This process allowed us to pinpoint the core user pain points and optimize the shopping experience, creating a more culturally relevant e-commerce platform for the Asian community.
Persona :
What was done
Created a detailed persona for Annie, a 27-year-old programmer living in Sydney, who faces frustrations with offline shopping due to crowded stores and product availability.
Focused on understanding her core needs: better product navigation, personalized recommendations, and fast, trackable delivery.
Key Takeaways
Identified Annie’s key motivations: convenience, product selection, and fast delivery.
Highlighted the importance of a seamless online shopping experience that meets both functional and emotional needs.
Used this persona to guide the design of a more user-centered platform, ensuring it aligns with Annie’s expectations and pain points.
pain points :
What was done
Through user interviews and research, we identified key pain points related to both offline and online shopping experiences in Asian supermarkets.
Focused on challenges like limited product variety, poor navigation, long delivery times, and the lack of control over product selection.
Key Takeaways
Offline Pain Points: Stores are overcrowded, poorly organized, and lack variety, making shopping difficult.
Online Pain Points: Users struggle with unclear navigation, limited product selection, unreliable delivery times, and lack of product tracking.
These insights helped us understand the critical areas to improve for a better user experience.
Journey map :
To understand the full shopping experience, we mapped out the journey of our target users, focusing on both their online and offline shopping behaviors at Asian supermarkets.
Through this process, we identified key moments in the shopping flow, from product discovery to delivery. We highlighted emotional ups and downs, including the excitement of finding the right product and the frustration with delivery delays or unclear tracking.
Key pain points surfaced in areas like product navigation, where users struggled with finding and comparing items, and the lack of clear delivery timelines. These insights have given us a focused direction for improving the shopping experience—especially in simplifying navigation, providing clearer delivery tracking, and giving users more control over their selections.
WireFrame:
To design a seamless user experience, we created a wireflow to map out key user interactions within the app. This wireflow visually represents the user journey through the platform, highlighting each screen and interaction step.
We focused on simplifying the flow, ensuring that users can easily navigate through the product search, comparison, and checkout processes. The wireflow also included key decision points, such as selecting payment methods and choosing delivery options, to ensure a smooth and intuitive flow.
The result was a clear, actionable blueprint that streamlined the user experience, making it easier for users to move from one step to the next without confusion or frustration.
Low-fidelity:
We developed a low-fidelity prototype to quickly test and validate the basic structure and flow of the app. This early-stage design focused on layout, navigation, and core functionality without detailed visuals or interactive elements.
The goal was to ensure that the overall user journey was intuitive and that key features—such as product search, filtering, and checkout—were easy to use and logically connected. By keeping the prototype simple, we could gather quick feedback and iterate on the design without investing too much time in high-fidelity details.
The feedback from testing helped us identify areas for improvement, especially around navigation clarity and the flow between screens, leading to a more refined design in the next iteration.
Mood board:
High-fidelity :
More Projects
UI/UX
asya
Online Asian supermarket project
Australia is a multicultural country, with over 17% of the population of Asian descent. While online grocery shopping is booming, mainstream platforms often fail to meet Asian users’ needs for authenticity, language support, and delivery reliability.
Year :
2025
Industry :
Retail
Project Duration :
10 weeks
Problem :
As an Asian designer living abroad, I personally experienced the frustration of poor UX and limited access to authentic food. This project is my response—to explore how culturally aware, user-centered design can improve everyday shopping for underserved communities.
Desktop Research :
According to my desktop research: There are many differences between people with Asian background who live in Australia and mainstream local consumers (mainstream Australian consumers) in their daily shopping.
Asian and local Australian User Behavior Differences:
Product Preferences: Asians focus on rice, sauces, tofu, and seasonal specialties; locals prefer pasta, bread, and salad items.
Shopping Frequency: Asians shop more frequently (2–4x/week) and prefer planned, batch purchasing.
Decision-Making: Asian families often shop for the whole household, valuing familiar brands; locals shop individually and prioritize price.
UX Expectations: Asians expect Chinese-language support, cultural relevance, and personalized suggestions; locals expect fast search and clean UI.
Holiday Products: Local apps support Western holidays; Asian shoppers expect items for Lunar New Year, Mid-Autumn, etc.
These behavioral and cultural differences suggest the need for tailored UX approaches in search, categorization, and product presentation.
user Interviews :
After completing desktop research, I wanted to go beyond numbers and understand how real users think and feel when shopping for Asian groceries in Australia.
The goal was to uncover:
Why users still prefer offline shopping despite poor experiences
What emotional or practical barriers stop them from using online platforms
What they value most in the shopping journey
What I Found
Despite being dissatisfied with offline stores, none of the participants had ever used an online Asian supermarket.
Their reasons revealed a deep trust gap and usability issues:
🥦 Control matters: Users want to select fresh items themselves and don’t trust staff to pick for them.
🚚 Delivery concerns: High delivery fees, slow shipping, and lack of tracking cause frustration.
🔍 Poor navigation: Hard-to-find categories and limited search options reduce efficiency.
💳 Cultural mismatch: Many apps lack bilingual support and familiar payment options like Alipay or WeChat Pay.
💬 Missing social proof: No user reviews or recommendations make it hard to build confidence.
Empathy map :
User Empathy Map & Design Insights
To address the pain points faced by the Asian community in Australia while shopping at Asian supermarkets, I conducted interviews with 7 users and created an empathy map to better understand their thoughts, feelings, and behaviors.
What was done
Collected insights through user interviews, focusing on emotional barriers and pain points such as concerns about product quality, delivery times, and payment methods.
Visualized these insights with an empathy map, guiding the team to focus on user needs and driving design iterations.
Key Takeaways
Defined design directions, particularly in improving navigation, product selection, personalized recommendations, and delivery tracking.
Gained a deeper understanding of the cultural differences within the target user group (especially the Asian community), providing strong user context for subsequent designs.
This process allowed us to pinpoint the core user pain points and optimize the shopping experience, creating a more culturally relevant e-commerce platform for the Asian community.
Persona :
What was done
Created a detailed persona for Annie, a 27-year-old programmer living in Sydney, who faces frustrations with offline shopping due to crowded stores and product availability.
Focused on understanding her core needs: better product navigation, personalized recommendations, and fast, trackable delivery.
Key Takeaways
Identified Annie’s key motivations: convenience, product selection, and fast delivery.
Highlighted the importance of a seamless online shopping experience that meets both functional and emotional needs.
Used this persona to guide the design of a more user-centered platform, ensuring it aligns with Annie’s expectations and pain points.
pain points :
What was done
Through user interviews and research, we identified key pain points related to both offline and online shopping experiences in Asian supermarkets.
Focused on challenges like limited product variety, poor navigation, long delivery times, and the lack of control over product selection.
Key Takeaways
Offline Pain Points: Stores are overcrowded, poorly organized, and lack variety, making shopping difficult.
Online Pain Points: Users struggle with unclear navigation, limited product selection, unreliable delivery times, and lack of product tracking.
These insights helped us understand the critical areas to improve for a better user experience.
Journey map :
To understand the full shopping experience, we mapped out the journey of our target users, focusing on both their online and offline shopping behaviors at Asian supermarkets.
Through this process, we identified key moments in the shopping flow, from product discovery to delivery. We highlighted emotional ups and downs, including the excitement of finding the right product and the frustration with delivery delays or unclear tracking.
Key pain points surfaced in areas like product navigation, where users struggled with finding and comparing items, and the lack of clear delivery timelines. These insights have given us a focused direction for improving the shopping experience—especially in simplifying navigation, providing clearer delivery tracking, and giving users more control over their selections.
WireFrame:
To design a seamless user experience, we created a wireflow to map out key user interactions within the app. This wireflow visually represents the user journey through the platform, highlighting each screen and interaction step.
We focused on simplifying the flow, ensuring that users can easily navigate through the product search, comparison, and checkout processes. The wireflow also included key decision points, such as selecting payment methods and choosing delivery options, to ensure a smooth and intuitive flow.
The result was a clear, actionable blueprint that streamlined the user experience, making it easier for users to move from one step to the next without confusion or frustration.
Low-fidelity:
We developed a low-fidelity prototype to quickly test and validate the basic structure and flow of the app. This early-stage design focused on layout, navigation, and core functionality without detailed visuals or interactive elements.
The goal was to ensure that the overall user journey was intuitive and that key features—such as product search, filtering, and checkout—were easy to use and logically connected. By keeping the prototype simple, we could gather quick feedback and iterate on the design without investing too much time in high-fidelity details.
The feedback from testing helped us identify areas for improvement, especially around navigation clarity and the flow between screens, leading to a more refined design in the next iteration.
Mood board:
High-fidelity :