How a complete redesign of a sustainable coffee subscription app increased user retention by 47% and transformed a struggling product into a category leader.
Good morning
Alex ☀️
Next Delivery
Ethiopian Yirgacheffe
Arriving in 4 days
Your Impact
12
Trees
84
Kg CO₂
6
Farmers
Discover
Colombian Supremo
Medium · Fruity
Kenya AA
Light · Bright
Role
Lead Product Designer
Timeline
14 Weeks · Jan–Apr 2024
Platform
iOS & Android App
Tools
Figma, Miro, Mixpanel
Grounded was a sustainable coffee subscription startup founded in 2021 with a clear mission: connect coffee lovers with ethically sourced beans while tracking their environmental impact. The concept was strong. The execution wasn't.
When I joined as Lead Product Designer, the app had a 68% drop-off rate after the first delivery, a 2.3-star App Store rating, and a churn rate that was bleeding the company's runway. The founders were passionate but overwhelmed — they needed someone who could translate their vision into a product people actually wanted to use.
Over 14 weeks, I led a complete redesign of the product experience — from information architecture and visual design to user onboarding and engagement systems. This is the story of how we did it.
Most users never returned after their first delivery. The onboarding flow was confusing, and there was no clear reason to open the app again.
The core differentiator — tracking environmental impact — was buried in settings. Users had no sense of the good they were doing.
The UI felt transactional. There was no personality, no warmth, and no sense of the human stories behind each bag of coffee.
Create compelling reasons for users to return to the app between deliveries through engagement features and personalization.
Design an impact dashboard that turns abstract sustainability metrics into tangible, shareable achievements.
Build a warm, editorial design system that reflects Grounded's artisan identity and creates an emotional connection with users.
From Transactional
To Transformational
Every decision was rooted in user research and validated through testing. Here's how we moved from problem to solution.
We started by listening. I conducted 18 user interviews with churned and active subscribers, analyzed 2,400+ support tickets, and ran a competitive audit of 12 subscription apps. The patterns were clear: users felt disconnected between deliveries and had no understanding of their sustainability impact.
Key Insights
73% of users never opened the app between deliveries — it felt like a receipt, not a relationship
Users wanted to feel part of a community, not just a transaction. Stories about farmers and origins were the most-shared content
The impact tracking feature existed but was hidden. When shown to users in testing, 89% said it would make them more likely to continue
Design Decisions
Warm Earth Palette
Espresso, cream, sage, and clay tones to evoke the coffee experience
Editorial Typography
Serif headings for warmth, clean sans-serif for readability and clarity
Story-First Layout
Each coffee gets a narrative — origin, farmer, process — not just specs
Impact Dashboard
Central, visual, and shareable — making sustainability tangible
Armed with insights, I mapped a new information architecture and designed a complete visual system. The core philosophy: every screen should tell a story. I created a design system with 120+ components, built 40+ high-fidelity screens, and prototyped the entire user journey in Figma.
We ran three rounds of usability testing with 36 participants. The first round revealed that our impact dashboard was too complex. We simplified it from 8 metrics to 3 core ones and added visual progress indicators. Round two showed our new onboarding flow reduced confusion by 62%.
Testing Results
Launch Strategy
A/B
Rolled out to 50% of users first, comparing against the old experience for 2 weeks before full launch
2.0
Major version bump with in-app tour and email campaign to re-engage lapsed users
24/7
Monitored analytics and user feedback continuously for the first month post-launch
I worked closely with the engineering team through development, conducting design QA on every screen. We launched with a phased rollout — A/B testing the new experience against the old for two weeks before going all-in. The results spoke for themselves.
Emotional Design
Instead of listing coffee specs like a catalog, each bean gets a narrative card: where it was grown, who farmed it, and what makes it unique. We included a short video snippet and tasting notes presented as a flavor wheel.
Result: 3.2x increase in time spent per session
Impact Dashboard
We moved impact tracking from settings to the home screen. Three simple metrics — trees planted, CO₂ saved, farmers supported — update in real-time. Users can share their impact on social media and compete in monthly challenges.
Result: Impact dashboard became the #1 most-visited screen
Onboarding Flow
The old onboarding took 4 minutes and asked 12 questions. We cut it to 60 seconds with 3 progressive questions, using smart defaults and letting users customize later. We also added a "skip" option that still personalized based on their first pick.
Result: Onboarding completion rate went from 34% to 89%
Community Features
We added a community feed where users share brewing tips, rate coffees, and join monthly challenges. A "Bar of the Month" feature lets users vote on next month's featured origin, giving them ownership in the curation process.
Result: 67% of active users participate in at least one community feature monthly
Measured 90 days after full launch, compared to the previous quarter's baseline.
47%
Increase in user retention
89%
Onboarding completion rate
4.6★
App Store rating (was 2.3)
3.2×
Increase in session time
"Mara didn't just redesign our app — she reimagined what our product could be. She understood our mission in a way that no designer had before, and she translated it into an experience that our users genuinely love. Our churn dropped dramatically within the first month, and for the first time, we have users who are emotionally invested in our brand."
James Rodriguez
Co-founder & CEO, Grounded
The most impactful changes weren't about making things faster or easier — they were about making users feel something. The coffee stories and impact dashboard worked because they created meaning, not just convenience.
Cutting the onboarding from 12 questions to 3 didn't mean losing information — it meant being smarter about when to ask. Progressive disclosure is one of the most powerful tools in a designer's arsenal.
Analytics told us what was broken. User interviews told us why. The best design decisions came from sitting with real people and understanding their relationship with coffee, sustainability, and community.
The biggest lesson
Great product design isn't about making things look pretty. It's about understanding people deeply enough to build something that makes their lives genuinely better.
Explore more projects from my portfolio
I'm currently available for freelance projects and full-time roles. If you're looking for a designer who cares deeply about craft, strategy, and outcomes — let's talk.