Uber Travel

Creating a new experience to shift Uber from an on-demand, point to point ride-hailing app to a pre-planned, door-to-door, multimodal travel platform.
Client Uber
Role Creative Director, Experience lead
Year 2023
The Problem

The ride hailing market has become saturated. With more choice for consumers and drivers; Uber had lost their USP. They needed to forge new ground, use their dominance to do something the other newer players couldn't. They needed to own all of travel, not just the taxi part.
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To do this they needed to a few things:
1. Shift perception from a point to point ride hailing app, to a multi-modal travel provider.
2. Design a connected experience that made travelers feel confident about booking big travel decisions.
3. Amplify what makes Uber special, to allow them to stand out.

This meant that we needed to approach the solution from two fronts. Experience, and Brand.
Experience, so that we develop and land on the best solution to solve a problem for Uber and their customers. Brand, so that we create something that it feels seamless, like Uber had always done it, and was mad that they hadn't.

The Solution

We engaged in a bottom-up design process, starting with use case analysis and consumer needs. Through qualitative and quantitative testing (focus groups, surveys), we identified that control and reassurance were essential for users when planning and adapting their journeys.
We mapped and prototyped over 60+ potential features to address these concerns.

We adopted a standard Double Diamond approach, iterating between discovery and delivery. The goal was to design both the right features and ensure they were executed well. This agile, flexible process allowed us to balance between Uber’s tech-heavy “product-up” perspective and the traditional “brand-down” methodology.

Three key product ideas emerged:
‍Flat-Fee Travel Pass: Allowing users to prepay for multiple modes of transport within a radius.
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‍Connected Journey: Real-time, dynamic route optimization, adjusting transport combinations mid-trip.
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‍Know You’ll Get There: A disruption management tool offering real-time monitoring, rebooking options, and guaranteed arrival.

We then prototyped and tested all of these features, until we had one solid concept that we could take to market. The connected Journey. Framing Uber as the glue between all your disparate travel modes.

Making it real

Too often in brand consultancies we end a project with a gorgeous deck full of promises and 'what if's'. Here we we're tasked with making this concept real.
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Adapting and developing the existing Uber brand
We worked with senior creative directors at Uber to develop the current brand for the new future. Everything from visual identity to verbal identity.

Full product design sprints
We worked with Uber engineers to design and build the solution in the main Uber app, adapting the existing design language for this multi-modal future.

Designing for advertising and OOH
Developing the Uber brand for out of home designs that were taken live across the UK in late 2023.

Selected work
Client
001
Nike Virtual Closet
2021
↗
002
Uber Travel
2023
–
003
O2 Brand Refresh
2024
–
004
Lloyds Bank (coming soon)
2024
–
005
Spotify Kids – Content explorer
2020
↗
006
Nike SB: On-Demand
2019
↗
007
Google Local Opportunity Finder
2020
↗
008
Liv What'sApp bot for Estée Lauder
2020
↗
009
A number of product vision showcases for Google
2019 - 2021
↗
010
NBA Verified
2021
↗
011
Learn with Facebook
2018 - 2019
↗
012
Nike Cryptokicks (Available on request)
2019 - 2021
–
013
Virtual Try on with Messenger (coming soon)
2018
–
For passwords and additional work, please get in touch.