The objective
The journey began with a pivotal question: could customers be given the freedom to customize their orders within Mendix? Despite the abundance of existing e-commerce solutions, integrating a new tool would mean additional costs and dependency on external APIs. Given that the backend was already in Mendix, managing orders and shipments, achieving customization in Mendix itself was the ideal solution.
The Process
We commenced with an exploratory phase to understand typical e-commerce solutions and identify key features to incorporate into Froot's system. Our aim was to create a familiar and intuitive ordering process, akin to online grocery shopping.
The initial design was based on Flexbox to ensure full responsiveness, accommodating spontaneous order adjustments on mobile devices. Regardless of the used device, the system scales, from a clear grid on a monitor to a long list on a mobile device.
Successful tests confirmed the feasibility of this approach, leading to the development of a comprehensive customer portal. An important requirement creating the main dashboard was allowing contacts to manage orders for multiple locations. The portal provides customers with an overview of new and ongoing orders, and allows them to differentiate orders by location, offering a clear distinction between subscriptions and one-time deliveries.
The innovative aspect of this solution is the ability for customers to customize their orders independently without contact customer support.
The overview page resembles an online supermarket, with products displayed in a grid format. We added badges for highlighting specific products, allowing marketing to insert variable texts like 'new' or 'fresh harvest.' Building the solution entirely in Mendix enabled direct control over the grid's content, ensuring relevance to each customer.
Communicating bulk pricing
A significant challenge was managing volume discounts without confusing customers. In the first versions the customer was not aware of the prices dynnamicaly changing and in later itterations they were aware of the bulk discount - but had a no clear insights in the actual discount. We resolved this by displaying both the standard and discounted prices per piece, with the discounted price adjusting automatically as more products are added to the cart. This clear representation of volume discounts is summed up on the overview receipt.
The results
The result is a comprehensive Mendix solution, eliminating the need for external e-commerce tools. Customers can manage all subscriptions and orders via a responsive, mobile-friendly dashboard. This platform allows Froot to share updates while enabling customers to tailor their fruit subscriptions independently and efficiently.
Reduced customer service requirement
Increased CLV (Customer Lifetime Value)
A responsive, mobile-friendly design
New marketing and sales strategy oppertunities
