PROJECT OVERVIEW
CLIENT
Abdullah Al Othaim Markets
MY ROLE
Design Lead, via Plexable
SCOPE
Sign-in, orders, picking, scanning, replacements, review, payment and bag stickers
VALIDATION
The Othaim team walked a full order through a clickable prototype before the build, from a new order to a printed bag sticker.
TIMELINE
2019, from the first flows to the December release
TEAM
Delivered through Plexable with the Abdullah Al Othaim Markets team
The context
Abdullah Al Othaim Markets runs Speedi, its online grocery service in Saudi Arabia. Orders are picked by store staff inside Othaim's own stores in Riyadh.
In 2019 Othaim asked for the staff side of that service: one Android app for picking, scanning and paying.
My responsibility
The design calls on this one were mine to make, from how an order is picked to what happens when an item is not on the shelf.
They were made with the Othaim team, not handed to them finished.
Leading this one meant setting the rules first and drawing screens second, then holding those rules as the flows changed around them.
The Othaim team supplied how their stores and their loyalty programme work.
CONSTRAINTS & TRADE-OFFS
This app is used standing up, in a busy supermarket, on a phone, by someone whose other hand is full.
That pushed everything towards large targets and short steps, and it cost density: a picker sees fewer items per screen than a list on a desk would show.
● RESEARCH & CONTEXT
WHAT PICKERS RUN INTO
Three things come up on a picking round: the item is not on the shelf, the item is sold by weight, and the order still has to be paid for.
A picker needs to mark something as not found quickly and offer the customer a replacement.
● PRODUCT DECISIONS
FAST, ACCURATE PICKING
The job was to get the right item at the right weight and the right price into the bag, and to show every change before checkout.
So the screens lean on colour and size rather than wording: green for found and done, red for not found and errors, yellow for anything waiting on the customer, and the Speedi typefaces set large enough to read at arm's length.
● PRODUCT ARCHITECTURE
ORDER STATES
An order lives in three tabs. To do holds what is still to find, grouped by section of the store. In review holds the missing and replaced items waiting on the customer. Done holds what is picked and checked, ready to pay for and pack.
Payment closes the order: the invoice total is scanned at the till, then the bag stickers print.
● PROCESS & EVIDENCE
What survives from the work is a complete screen set rather than a few hero screens: the straight path, the alerts that interrupt it, and the whole thing again in the second language.
Plexable's developers built the Android app from that set.
OUTCOMES
ON THE STORE FLOOR
Speedi Picker went live on Google Play in December 2019, ahead of the apps shoppers use, and it is still running today.
3
Design rounds
Two ran under the name Marty Picker before version three became Speedi Picker.
50+
Screens designed
Every step and every error state, drawn in Arabic and in English.
5K+
Installs on Google Play
Reached by a tool only Othaim store staff download.
WHAT I’D IMPROVE
WHAT I WOULD CHANGE
Try the one-handed flows with pickers on a real shop floor, not only with the team that commissioned them.
Put the time left on the payment code where the picker can see it, since it expires.
WHAT I LEARNED
WHAT IT TAUGHT ME
A staff app sets what the customer gets: the bag at the door is the only part of this work shoppers ever see.
Designing both languages from the start is cheaper than fitting Arabic in afterwards.
More work
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