Bethany Steele
Jenn and Adrian are opening a bakery to create a place for their daughter Zoe who has autism to have community and purpose with other adults who have autism. They reached out to me to create a website that was easy to update, communicated the branding, and included the ability to add an online shop.
zoesdezzerts.com was the final website and is still occasionally updated as the needs of the bakery change.
Initial Challenges
The bakery was in transition from pop-up shops to a renovated building. The website needed to account for communicating the story of the bakery to the users so they could grow familiar with the processes of placing orders and where to find updates. Zoe’s Just Dezzerts did have a logo but there was not an established brand guide that could be used for the user interface colors and fonts.
The Goal
Speaking with the owners of the bakery and understanding their needs indicated to me that they needed a website that was informational and flexible. The website needed to be up quickly and could be iterated on as time went on. Its primary goal was marketing and giving people an online place to get to know the brand as they released new information.
“I had so many people tell me they loved the website!”
“I had so many people tell me they loved the website!”
These are the areas of improvement identified after the initial launch of the website.
The home page was designed with mobile users in mind. It features RSS feeds of the bakery blog and a calendar with recent events.
Since Zoe’s is currently in a pop-up shop it is important for users to know what is available and what the cost will be. This page features a menu with images and copy describing in detail each item.
Users can shop on this page using the e-commerce shop set up for delivery of shirts and hats. Shipping is connected through a third-party vendor selected by the client.
The pop-up shop page is a simple hamburger-style feed with information on events in the order in which they will occur. The client needed this section to be flexible.
The contact page is designed for users to find a direct email and address for the upcoming bakery opening. It focuses on important information with a simple layout.
To keep continuity and familiarity in the user flow the blog page uses a similar setup to the event page which is a hamburger-style menu with links to blog posts.
In the planning for this website, I identified the need for UI guidelines that could be integrated in print and online. Using the already-created logo and the feedback from the conversation with the owners I was able to create some initial guidelines for the website.