In 2019, As Creative Director at Destination Pet, I was asked to prototype a front-end UI for a mobile app.

At the time, each Destination Pet location utilized a third-party POS software and connected web-app called Gingr. Gingr enabled clients to schedule appointments, view upcoming bookings, and upload documents related to their pets care, and it enabled center staff to centrally manage bookings and payment processing.

While Gingr was a great solution for the center staff, its dated interface and desktop-first design could be confusing to clients. We received frequent complaints about difficulty navigating the UI, as well as several requests for enabling mobile notifications for upcoming appointments— a functionality Gingr simply did not then have. The goal of the app was to create a mobile-first, user friendly experience that enabled clients to get everything Gingr offered, in addition to some quality-of-life improvements.

Destination Pet has dozens of locations throughout the United States, most of which had their own branding. Rather than design apps to the exact brand specifications of each location, which would have been prohibitively time-consuming and expensive, a secondary goal of this app was make clients more aware of the parent brand and the additional layer of services we brought to the centers.

A challenge in the pet care industry is that the majority of customers are middle-aged or elderly, and many of our centers were located in rural areas where high-speed internet access was often relatively new. Therefore my priorities as a designer were readability and ease-of-use; any user, regardless of technological literacy, should be able to navigate it without confusion.

This meant a few things. I utilized large, clear buttons and drop down menus that matched the style of our websites so that all customers could immediately know what actions to take. The app features bold, contrast heavy design to ensure readability for all age groups. Finally, a bottom navigation with easy-to-understand icons served to give clients easy access to all functionality.

Ultimately the project was shelved in favor of working with the Gingr team to increase functionality on their platform. But much of the work found its way onto the UI of our mobile sites.