Since late 2018, I've been working with Producers Market, a startup reimagining the global agricultural value chain to bring agriculture into the digital age. I've lead the UX/UI design for their marketplace application, and we just recently launched a new offering–the StoryBird application. Also designed by yours truly, StoryBird is a transparency application that facilitates access to stories and supply chain data, for consumers who seek transparency and quality.
For our first pilot, we focused on wild scallops from New England, tracing them from where they are caught off the coast of Nantucket all the way to TAPS Fish House & Brewery, a high end seafood restaurant in Southern California. By scanning a QR code on the TAPS menu, customers can access all supply chain information and stories directly from a mobile phone.
We collaborated with all the players along the scallops supply chain, including Nordic Inc, Raw Seafoods, Santa Monica Seafood, TAPS Fishhouse & Brewery, and IBM Food Trust, who provided the blockchain data that feeds into the StoryBird application.
This kind of transparency and storytelling is still relatively new for most supply chains, and a seafood supply chain in particular was the perfect pilot project, as the seafood industry has widespread problems with overfishing, fraud, and more. In recent DNA testing performed by the world's largest ocean conservation organization, Oceana, 21% of seafood samples in the U.S. were mislabeled (i.e. were labeled as a different species than they actually were).
This experience was designed mainly for mobile, as the intention was that customers could scan a QR code directly from the TAPS menu. I also created a desktop version, shown below.
Conclusion
TAPS Fish House & Brewery increased the sale of their scallops dishes by 30% over the previous year, due mostly to this StoryBird effort. So it seems that access to supply chain story and transparency data does motivate purchases, which is exciting! Please check out the full experience at: storybird.producersmarket.com/taps/scallops.
