Skincare is Personal, Again.
Heyday is a single service, retail concept similar to Drybar with the mission of "taking the facial out of the spa and into your life". When I joined Heyday in 2021 the company was dependent on a number of 3rd party tools to power booking, treatment records, e-commerce, and other crucial business functions. The tech stack, and as result the user experience, was very fractured.
As we developed a new middleware to manage customer data, we simultaneously took on the design of an iOS app. Building the app alongside the middleware provided greater clarity on the architectural requirements needed to support our product vision. We recognized that a mobile app could not only resolve key customer pain points but also create engaging experiences to strengthen relationships with our most loyal clients—our members.
Role:
Design Lead
What I Did:
UX/UI
User Research
Prototyping
Brand Refresh
Design System
The Vision
Unlock the power of a personalized app to make appointment booking a breeze, empower our members, and extend the magic of the facial beyond the treatment room.
Personalized Experience
Just like your esthetician, the app remembers your preferences — what shop you prefer, what team members you’ve seen, and even what products your esthetician recommended for your routine.
Unlocking the ability to manage appointments in the app was a key feature. Previously, clients had to call shops directly to change appointments.
From our user research, we found that clients trusted recommendations from their esthetician and we knew this could be a powerful lever to increase AOV and LTV.
Heyday Magic
Most clients got a facial every couple of months, so we wanted the magic of the treatment room to follow them outside our doors to help them maintain their glow.
From our user research, we found that clients wanted an easier way to engage with advice from their esthetician and manage their routine.
Empowering Members
With over 70% of clients finding value in a Heyday membership, we aimed to empower them to join, manage their membership, and clearly see the benefits of their investment in the app.
Adding membership sign-up to the app (and eventually the web) was a huge unlock for the business since we previously relied on in-person sales.
Design System
I collaborated with the Creative team to refine and elevate the brand’s visual language, codifying it into a design system that supported app development and scaled with the evolving product ecosystem.
Process & Outcomes
Prior to my time at Heyday, the company had never done user research. So in order to have the insights we needed to start working on the app, I built out a foundational research plan, onboarded the team to a new research tool (Lookback.io), defined our participant agreement and research incentives, worked with Marketing to create an email recruitment process, and guided the Senior PD working with me on how to conduct user interviews.
While going through this process, Heyday also went through a brand refresh. Given the fast-paced environment we were in, the team and I needed to be really efficient with our UX iterations, usability testing, visual design explorations, and technical research into 3rd party API’s. That’s where great communication, clear timelines, and product requirements came in handy. I took charge of the design and research timeline and requirements, and worked closely with the product team and outside stakeholders through design workshops, design reviews, and technical check-ins to get the job done.
The Team:
Design: Nate Baker, Vika
Product: Nandhita Kumar, Dan Cerney, Alison Turka
Engineering Lead: John McKinney
/01
03
Rounds of user testing
/02
16
Total users tested across Members and Clients
/03
2x
Boost to booking conversion vs. the web
/04
15%
Increase to rebooking rate vs. the web
/05
50%
Push notification opt-in rate
