Learn how to bartend without breaking the bank!

bar ONE

  • đź‘© My role: UX Researcher and Designer, Brand Designer
  • ‍💼 Project: B2C, responsive website
  • 🗓️ Timeline: November/December 2024
High-fidelity mock up of bar ONE sign in page with logo consisting of a neon pink and orange Boston shaker with a bar spoon sticking out of the small side of the shaker and the words "bar ONE" in blue. The logo is made to look like a neon signHigh-fidelity mobile mock up of the drink recipe page. There is a short glass partway showing on the right side of the screen with the ingredients split out into layers. On the left side of the screen it lists in the ingredients and their quantities. It's for a margarita. Starting at the bottom, there's .75 oz of simple syrup, .75 oz of lime juice, .75 oz of triple sec, 1.5 oz of blanco tequila, ice, salt rim, and a lime wedge garnish.

Overview

Bartending school can cost anywhere from $400 to over $1,300, which is a lot when starting out—especially considering the median hourly pay (including tips) is around $12/hr. It's possible to learn through books and YouTube but it won't be a curated learning experience designed to help you succeed.

Objective

Design and develop a fully responsive website that delivers a curated, interactive learning experience for aspiring bartenders.  

Research Strategy

  • Defining the user group with a survey
  • Performing competitive analysis
  • Conducting user interviews
  • Synthesizing data
  • Researching what the experts have to say about the major pain point: memorization

Pain Points and Solutions

A survey question: "8. Please rank the following aspects on how difficult they were to master, 1 being really easy and 5 being very difficult." Below is a bar graph that indicates out of shaking vs stirring, proportions, memorizing builds, and how to shake, Proportions and memorizing builds are the most difficult to master.

Pain Points

The two major pain points centered around memorization. How might we design intuitive memory aids or interactive cues that help bartenders quickly recall ingredients and proportions for over 100 classic cocktails in a fast-paced, high-pressure bar environment?

Since bartending schools are expensive, barOne needs to be competitive. How might we effectively target budget-conscious users while maintaining scalability for long-term revenue growth?

Solutions

My solutions for these pain points:

  • For a minimum viable product (MVP), the quickest solution is flashcards! With interactions for both ingredient and proportion memorization, it addresses the two major pain points.
  • An optional survey to curate the experience and funnel users interested in premium options towards subscription plans.
  • After launching an MVP, new features can be iteratively introduce that not only enhance user engagement and solve validated user problems, but also strategically drive scalable revenue growth.
high fidelity mobile mock up of the "Add or Review" screen. There is a orange and pink neon outline box at the top of the screen that says "Review Deck." Below that is a search icon next to "Add recipes to deck" and below that are two "decks" of cards, one in orange and pink outline that says "Specialty Recipes" and a blue one in the foreground that says "Standard Recipes."
high fidelity mobile mock up of the Choose a Plan page. It has a Free card with 2 of the six checkboxes with blue check marks and below that is a card for "Basic - $5 per month" with four of the checkboxes checked. The check boxes are as follows: 150 Cocktail Recipe Flashcards, 50 Shooter Recipe Flashcards, Access to videos and articles, Make your own flashcards, Quarterly giftbag, and Access to AI mnemonic creation.

Final Product

high-fidelity mock up of the Ingredients and proportions page. It has a Boston shaker at the top of the screen with ice in the small part and nothing in the big part. Below that are two jiggers with rotation arrows. The bigger jigger says 0.75 oz at the top and 1.5 oz at the bottom, while the small jigger has 0.5 oz at the top and 1 oz at the bottom. At the bottom of the screen are four ingredient tiles that are not yet revealed. There is an instructional note: "1. Flip the cards to see if you know the ingredients."high-fidelity mock up of the Ingredients and proportions page with an instructional note: "2. When the ingredient is highlighted, click the jigger with the correct measurement." The first ingredient tile is now visible with an orange and pink neon outline. It shows a small illustration of a sugar cannister and says "Simple Syrup."high-fidelity mock up of the Ingredients and proportions page with an instructional note: "3. Use the rotate button to flip the jigger if the measurement you want is on the bottom."high-fidelity mock up of the Ingredients and proportions page with an instructional note: "4. If your guess is correct, the ingredient tile will turn blue." The empty Boston shaker at the top of the screen now has one gray layer in it to indicate the ingredient has been added. The simple syrup tile is now outlined in neon blue.high-fidelity mock up of the Ingredients and proportions page with an instructional note: "5. Okay, now you try!" The shaker is empty again and the simple syrup ingredient tile is no longer revealed.
High-fidelity tablet mock up of the drink recipe page. There is a short glass partway showing on the right side of the screen with the ingredients split out into layers. On the left side of the screen it lists in the ingredients and their quantities. It's for a margarita. Starting at the bottom, there's .5 oz of simple syrup, .75 oz of lime juice, .75 oz of triple sec, 1.5 oz of blanco tequila, ice, salt rim, and a lime wedge garnish.high-fidelity tablet mock up of the Ingredients and proportions page. It has a Boston shaker at the top of the screen with ice in the small part and two different gray layers in the big part to indicate two ingredients have been added. Next to that are two jiggers with rotation arrows. The bigger jigger says 0.75 oz at the top and 1.5 oz at the bottom, while the small jigger has 0.5 oz at the top and 1 oz at the bottom. At the bottom of the screen are four ingredient tiles, two of which are outlined in blue to indicate they have been correctly guessed and added (Simple syrup and Lime juice), followed by a tile outlined in orange and pink labeled Triple Sec, and a final unrevealed tile.
three high-fidelity mobile mock-ups overlapping. To the right it says "Final Prototype."

Takeaways

This was such a fun project to work on. So fun in fact, I had to constantly check myself. I kept having more and more ideas for features when I needed to keep my eye on the priority: create an MVP. I would have had a blast continuing to develop this if it had taken off.

Want to read the long version?

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