UNIVERSITY BOOK STORE
DubsBooks is a student-first course materials platform that helps UW students confirm requirements, compare prices, and plan pickup, returns, or resale with confidence.
Client: University Book Store
Role: Product Designer & Team Lead
Team: 3 researchers, 2 designers
Timeline: 8 months
Tools: Figma, FigJam, Photoshop, Illustrator, Discord
My contributions: Led research synthesis, service blueprinting, usability testing, and the end-to-end prototype flow.
Product impact: Reduced course-material search friction by turning a fragmented textbook-buying journey into one student-first flow.
DubsBooks
Designed for University of Washington students, DubsBooks turns registered courses into a course materials list, price comparison tool, and student marketplace. It helps students make more informed decisions before, during, and after the quarter.
All of your courses, in one place
Log in with your UW NetID to see your registered courses and required materials in one place.
Compare prices, pick what works
Compare Book Store and third‑party options side-by-side, so you can choose what works best for your budget and timeline.
Buy used with confidence
Buy what you need, then return or resell it when it makes sense.
Where the textbook journey broke
Course materials are a hidden cost of college. During the University Book Store’s first post-COVID restructuring and refresh, our team was brought in to make the textbook journey clearer while staying grounded in the Book Store’s core principle: serve our students.
At the time, students often didn’t know what was required or when an order was ready, and the process showed the same breakdowns again and again: communication gaps, low trust in pricing and options, and a disconnected path from registration to purchase, then pickup, returns, and resale.
Why the Book Store cares
When students feel unsure, the rush gets slower for everyone. The Book Store needed clearer expectations around materials, order readiness, pickup, returns, and resale so students could make decisions with less staff intervention.
Clarity: Students could not quickly confirm what was required or whether an order was ready.
Trust: Prices and purchase options were hard to compare, which made costs feel unpredictable.
Connection: The process was split across tools, so planning, pickup, and returns or resale did not feel connected.
How might we improve the textbook ordering process with the University Book Store to provide the best experience for students as possible?
What we learned
We focused research around the start of winter and spring quarter, when textbook purchasing is at its highest volume. Our goal was to understand how students find required materials, compare options, and navigate pickup or returns during peak demand.
Contextual inquiry: observed rush prep and pickup to see where timing and information broke down.
Survey: quantified student purchasing behaviors and decision drivers.
Stakeholder interviews: captured Book Store, professor, legal, and operational constraints.
Intercept interviews: captured student emotions and pain points during peak buying hours.
Our findings
Satisfied but uncertain
In both our survey and our intercept interviews, students were frequently satisfied with their experiences.
Late purchase decisions
A majority of respondents make purchase decisions during the first week of the quarter, and get their information from course syllabi.
Information gaps persisted
Many students are unaware of which books to get and may ask for books that professors haven’t notified the bookstore about.
Fragmented tools slowed
Students had to identify required materials on one platform and purchase them on another, which created confusion and extra steps.
Who we designed for
We designed around three textbook-buying behaviors that showed up across research. Each group needed a different kind of confidence: timing, cost, or trust.
In-store pickup planners: need reliable order status and pickup timing.
Digital-first buyers: need upfront cost, access deadlines, and “what’s included” clarity.
Deal seekers / secondhand buyers: need price comparison, trust signals, and resale support.
These buyer types helped us prioritize the product around three jobs: confirm requirements, compare options, and plan next steps.
Service design blueprnt
The service blueprint showed that the biggest breakdown was not one screen, it was the handoff between course registration, textbook lookup, order status, pickup, and resale.
Before: scattered handoffs
Students bounced across registration, syllabi, Book Store pages, emails, and pickup steps to answer basic questions.
After: one connected student flow
DubsBooks connected course materials, order status, timing, and resale into one predictable path.
From blueprint to product
We used two anchors to move from research to product direction: the buyer types showed what students needed to feel confident, and the service blueprint showed where the current journey broke.
Once we mapped the existing process, we shifted from “document the journey” to “design the product.” We translated the biggest handoffs into screens, data needs, and trust cues, then used those guardrails to narrow the final product around three recommendations:
Integrate course materials into the registration process
Give students readily accessible information
Create a peer-to-peer marketplace
Narrowing the direction
Based on our design recommendations, we first explored two connected portals: one for students to purchase materials and one for professors to submit required course lists. The goal was to give students the latest textbook information directly through their registration flow. As team lead, I kept the project moving by aligning research synthesis, sponsor feedback, prototype priorities, and critique cycles around the student-facing textbook portal.
Reducing our features
We initially explored two connected portals: one for students purchasing materials and one for professors submitting course lists. After stakeholder feedback, we narrowed the scope. A professor-facing portal would have required operational and technical support the Book Store could not realistically maintain, so we focused on the student-facing flow. This pivot helped us focus our prototype on the part of the journey students could directly control: finding materials, comparing options, and planning next steps.
How we validated
We tested the mid-fidelity prototype with 4 students at the University of Washington across four tasks: locating the portal, finding course materials, purchasing a textbook, and listing a book on the marketplace. The goal was to identify where students hesitated, what information they expected sooner, and which decisions needed clearer support.
What changed after testing
Required materials needed to appear earlier
Students wanted to answer one question fast: “What do I need for this class?” In testing, participants expected to see required materials from the course list (without clicking into each course).
Signal: Participants hesitated when materials weren’t visible from the list.
Decision: Added an expand-per-course pattern so students can view required & optional materials from the list.
Result: Fewer clicks to confirm requirements, and a lower chance of missing a required item.
Surfacing required materials on the course list reduced the click-in/click-back loop and made it easier to confirm what was needed per class.
Price ranges made comparison faster
When students compare purchase options, they’re trying to estimate total cost + best value quickly. In testing, participants wanted a clear range (ex: $70–$120) instead of wading through every individual price.
Signal: A single price didn’t feel representative (new/used/digital/rental, Book Store vs external).
Decision: Added price ranges on listing cards and separated external options into a dedicated tab.
Result: Faster, clearer comparison across options, without wading through every price.
Showing a price range per book helped students quickly understand the cost spread without wading through every pricing option upfront.
Marketplace cards needed decision-making details
In the marketplace, students are evaluating listings quickly: is this the right book, at the right price, in the right condition? In testing, participants wanted more decision-making details surfaced upfront.
Signal: Participants paused and scrolled looking for key details.
Decision: Reworked the listing cards to prioritize details first, with images as supporting content.
Result: Faster evaluation of listings, with less second-guessing.
Rebalancing the card layout toward decision-making details helped students evaluate listings faster, with images supporting rather than leading.
How it fits end-to-end
After testing and refining DubsBooks, I returned to the service blueprint to make sure the updated experience still fit the full journey. I mapped the prototype flow back onto the blueprint, replacing the older “search and navigate” steps with a more direct NetID login path to registered courses and required materials. This helped validate that the changes improved the overall service flow, not just the interface.
What I’d measure next: task completion, time to find required materials, purchase confidence, pickup-readiness confusion, and marketplace listing completion.
Explore the prototype
The final clickable prototype shows the full student flow from login to course materials, price comparison, and marketplace browsing.
Implementation considerations
If DubsBooks moved toward build, the next step would be defining the data and operational states behind the student flow.
Data needs: registered courses, required/optional materials, inventory status, pickup readiness, return windows, resale listings.
Key states: no registered courses, unavailable materials, external purchase option, pickup not ready, return window closed.
Operational handoffs: professor submissions, Book Store inventory, confirmation emails, pickup processing, and marketplace moderation.
What I learned
DubsBooks felt like the perfect culmination of my time at the University of Washington. Much of my graduate work centered on improving daily student life on campus, from accessibility to everyday resources, so creating one final product for students, by students felt deeply connected to the work I had been building toward.
It was also my first real deep dive into service design, pushing me to think beyond individual screens and map the full system around a student experience. As designer and team lead, I learned how to translate a messy service journey into clearer product decisions, balancing student needs, Book Store constraints, and team momentum across an ambiguous 8-month project.
What I'd do differently…
Define success earlier: Clarify Book Store success metrics before ideation.
Prioritize research signals: Reduce overlap in findings and align faster around the highest-friction moments.
Validate assumptions sooner: Use structured checkpoints to separate team assumptions from student evidence.
Bring technical partners in earlier: Include UW-IT and Book Store systems stakeholders to understand integration constraints.
Close the academic loop: Share findings with professors or UW partners to validate the course-material submission side.
Huge thanks to my teammates, Wilson, Harry, Karneet & Kshitij, and the University Book Store team for making my last project at UW HCDE such an amazing experience!