bringing a breath of fresh air to office environments

KEYWORDS

UX/UI Design, Front-End Development, Back-End Development, DevOps, System Design and Architecture, Testing, Project Management, MVP, Agile Development

Team

Greete Tukk (NOPE) designer
Pärt Erikson principal developer
Timo Soiunen developer
Hiie-Helen Raju project manager

Visit the website

INTUIT’S BIRTH STORY

Intuit is a brand by Softrend, a company where experienced carpenters have been making custom furniture since 1997.

Initially, their goal with Intuit was to offer revolutionary and modern office interior solutions for businesses as a pdf document on Softrend’s e-commerce site. Since Intuit’s product range has grown rather wide and the furniture is customizable in many different ways, it seemed easier and more comfortable for the customers to shop on a completely separate webpage. Now, 10 months later, Intuit has its own e-commerce site where you can customize many details and the functionality of your desired office furniture. All their products are handmade right here in Estonia and the masters have made sure everything meets Softrend’s sustainability and quality standards.

Fun fact, Softrend’s online store was also developed and designed by us in cooperation with NOPE Creative and Miltton. Read more about the project here.

An overview of Intuit's products on the developed e-store
The products page gives the customer a clear overview of all the available furniture. From there you can simply move on to customize your chosen product.
A page for professionals in the e-store
There's a separate page for professionals with in depth media and information.

THE journey to a complete e-commerce store

A brief analysis revealed which new functionalities need to be implemented, and it was decided which of Softrend’s already existing functions could be carried over to Intuit.

Due to the tight timeline, the page’s development and design process happened in parallel – usually it’s design and user-testing first, and then off to the development. This definitely put the teamwork and agility between the developers and the designers to the test. In the end, everything worked out great – you could even say it brought the developers and designers closer together.

The MVP was launched in May 2022 – customers couldn’t buy any products in this version. Instead, they were able to browse them as a catalog. The ability to purchase and configure the furniture was added in the second stage of developing the online store. The fully functional e-commerce site was launched in February 2023.

The website enables to move between work zones and office breakout spaces
There's a feature that divides the office into 4 different zones that use modular and multi-functional furniture solutions to make the most out of every area in the office.

the challenges & what we learned

One of the biggest challenges in this project was the timeline – the MVP (Minimal Viable Product) of the e-commerce site had to be designed, developed, and launched in just a month. To do that, the project was divided into two stages. In the first version, the customers weren’t able to buy the products. Instead, the products were showcased as a catalog. The ability to purchase and configure the furniture was added in the second stage of the project.

When the client turned to us, they had lots of ideas and a clear vision had to be achieved through collaboration. This was another big challenge in this project. Usually, we take the time to advise the client and find the best solutions together, but this time we decided it would be best to follow Softrend’s example and make changes where necessary. At one point we realized that Softrend’s product configuration wasn’t exactly ideal for Intuit, so a new one had to be made. This created an interesting challenge for us, especially as it coincided with our and the client’s vacation times.

From the technical side, the biggest challenge in this project was the development of product configuration and the modular page structure – now you can rearrange all the modules and change the page structure. The customer can choose between multiple fabric types from different price groups, the shape and size of the furniture, and even the leg types. In order to achieve this we needed to connect the e-commerce site to a much more complex manufacturing software – just like we did with Softrend’s page.

developing a feature that allows the client to customize their products

RESULTS

  • A completely new online store (instead of a pdf document) was made for Intuit by Softrend to showcase their awesome office furniture and other open environments.
  • Product configuration so the customer can achieve their desired end result. It is possible to switch between a catalog view and a shopping view, where the product configuration becomes possible.
  • A downloads area with technical specs for industry professionals.

  • A demo of the 4 work zones concept in an interactive way, which brings out Intuit’s core strengths.

  • Modular and multi-functional furniture solutions to make the most of every area in the office, giving an agile space that fosters playful creativity – because employees who are comfortable do better work. Something we could not agree with more!

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