Reimagining online shopping for the better
THE PROBLEM
In the pursuit of selling more and faster, online shopping experiences are becoming increasingly manipulative, exploitative, and pushy. This is harming the planet, the customer, and even the business.
OUR VISION
We believe the future of online shopping is sustainable. Offering the convenience of buying online while designed to help make intentional and sustainable buying decisions. Kind to the user, to the planet and to the business.
WHAT WE DO
We raise awareness about the problem of pushy and manipulative e-commerce patterns and continuously develop tools and resources to help design and advocate for kinder online shopping experiences.
Why you should care
Why you should care
Your frictionless design harms your customer
“The order took maybe 15 seconds. I selected my size and put the shoes in my cart, and my phone automatically filled in my login credentials and added my new credit card number. You can always return them, I thought to myself as I tapped the “Buy” button. Almost as soon as I’d paid, I snapped out of the mania that had briefly overtaken me, $190 (Jesus Christ) poorer but with one pair of Jetsons-looking shoes on their way to my apartment. […] I had completed some version of the online checkout process a million times before, but never could I remember it being quite so spontaneous and thoughtless. If it’s going to be that easy all the time, I thought to myself, I’m cooked.”
- Amanda Mull, The Atlantic
Your pushy e-commerce is contributing to climate change and harming the planet
When you use Puhsy Patterns to drive conversion and impulse purchases, you get users to buy things they don’t need or don’t even want. Those unwanted items get thrown out or returned.
But, because return logistics are costly, items are frequently sent directly to landfills. 8 billion pounds of returned items end up in the trash every year.
Imagine the raw material, energy, chemicals, and labor that went into producing these products…just so they can be sent to the landfill without a single second of useful life. Where they will emit CO2 and release chemicals into the ground through their 100+ years of decay.
Your conversion focus harms your business
Applying manipulative e-commerce techniques to increase conversion or cart-value are undermining the relationship with customers. When they feel exploited or taken advantage of, they are less likely to build trust and become return customers.
In addition, returns resulting from thoughtless, impulse purchases are costly for the business.
“As designers, we need to see ourselves as gatekeepers of what we are bringing into the world, and what we choose not to bring into the world. Design is a craft with responsibility. The responsibility to help create a better world for all.”