Time Frame
April - May 2025
Role
UI/UX Designer
Platform
Mobile Apps
Introduction
Tomoro Coffee is an Indonesian-based coffee chain that launched in August 2022. It's known for offering high-quality coffee at affordable prices, with a mission to make specialty coffee more accessible to a wider audience.
Brand Growth
Tomoro Coffee has grown to 600+ stores across Indonesia and is rapidly expanding into China, Singapore, and the Philippines, aiming for 1,000 outlets by the end of 2024 and 3,000 across Southeast Asia in the coming years.
Background Story
While lining up at Tomoro Coffee, I struggled to find the member QR code. Its placement wasn’t familiar and was hard to reach with one hand. The screen was also crowded with banners, making it hard to focus on ordering. That experience pushed me to redesign the app for better clarity and ease of use.
Team
Worked independently as the sole designer. Based design decisions on user behavior patterns, personal observations, and industry design best practices.
Findings
Low visibility of key actions
The original homepage made it difficult for users to find frequently used features like the QR code scanner, loyalty points, or ordering shortcuts. These actions were often hidden behind additional taps or buried in non-obvious placements.Overcrowded and unstructured layout
The interface felt cluttered and too many competing elements on screen. This resulted in cognitive overload and friction when navigating the app.Unclear feature prioritization
Essential actions were given the same visual weight as secondary features. For instance, promotions and banners occupied prime screen real estate while key utilities like ordering or payment were harder to spot.Inconsistent experience across screens
Navigational logic and design styles varied between different sections of the app. This inconsistency made it harder for users to build mental models and slowed down repeat use.
Defining the Problem
How might we streamline the ordering process for users who want speed, while maintaining a simple and intuitive experience?
Goals
Business goals:
Increase User Retention:
Encourage users to return daily by making the home screen more engaging and useful.
User goals:
Start Tasks or Sessions Quickly:
Users want to jump into studying, planning, or their next task with minimal friction.
Stay Focused and Organized:
Users need a clear overview of what to do today, without feeling overwhelmed.
Track Progress Easily:
Users want to feel a sense of progress—seeing what they’ve accomplished or how consistent they’ve been.
Feel Motivated and Encouraged:
Subtle encouragement, streaks, or progress badges help users feel rewarded and motivated
Process
Define Problem → Gather Feedback → Wireframe → Prototype
I started by defining the core problems in the app, unfamiliar QR code placement and visual clutter. Then I gathered feedback from other users, translated insights into wireframes, and finally built a clickable prototype to explore better solutions.
Research and Ideation
Initiated lightweight research to validate assumptions and gather inspiration for improving usability and clarity in the app’s home screen.
Responsibilities included:
Browsed design references and patterns from similar apps (e.g., Kopi Kenangan, Fore, Starbucks) to understand how they structure key user actions.
Asked a friend who regularly uses Tomoro Coffee’s app for feedback on their pain points and usage habits.
Synthesized insights to identify common usability issues and drafted improvement opportunities focused on better action visibility and a cleaner layout.
Challenge and Most Interesting
The challenge was bringing a fun and fresh Tomoro vibe into the redesign while keeping the experience clear and usable. The most interesting part was finding the balance between business goals like promoting vouchers and campaigns, and maintaining a focused interface. It pushed me to prioritize what matters without losing the brand’s personality.
Key Takeaways
Real moments reveal real problems
Design should respond to how people actually use the app, not just how it looks on screenPlacement matters
Small element like a QR code needs to be intuitive and reachable, especially in high-pressure momentsLess is clarity
Too many visual elements distract from the core task. A focused layout helps users act fasterListen before you design
Gathering feedback early helps shape solutions that feel natural and truly useful.