Erin MacGregor

HOME

WORK

ABOUT

2026

Erin MacGregor

HOME

WORK

ABOUT

2026

Erin MacGregor

HOME

WORK

ABOUT

2026

Erin MacGregor

HOME

WORK

ABOUT

2026

Greeen:
Greeen:

A MICRO FINANCIAL GOAL SETTING APP

A MICRO FINANCIAL GOAL SETTING APP

DELIVERABLES

DELIVERABLES

MOBILE APP

MOBILE APP

STUDIO

STUDIO

LEMNISCATE

LEMNISCATE

ROLE

ROLE

LEAD DESIGNER

LEAD DESIGNER

LEAD DESIGNER

SERVICE

SERVICE

UI/UX, RESEARCH

UI/UX, RESEARCH

Overview

IT'S NOT HARD TO IMAGINE THAT TODAY,
PEOPLE ARE AT ODDS WITH THE RISING COST OF LIVING. MANY EVEN PHYSICALLY CRINGE WHEN GOING OVER HOUSEHOLD EXPENSES.

IT'S NOT HARD TO IMAGINE THAT TODAY,
PEOPLE ARE AT ODDS WITH THE RISING COST OF LIVING. MANY EVEN PHYSICALLY CRINGE WHEN GOING OVER HOUSEHOLD EXPENSES.

Times are tough. My goal in this project is not to frame that as doom and gloom. I wanted to deliver an experience that helps those who face constant spending anxiety breathe a little and reflect.

What if we felt good about spending? What if our banking apps told us all the good things we were doing for ourselves?

This project was developed over the course of eight months with a programmer partner and has culminated in creating our MVP and initial marketing phase. I handled research and design, while my counterpart dedicated themselves to deployment.

Research Phase

I started out our research for this case study reviewing user personas, needs, and developing identities based on a 30 participant study I conducted. The responses were surprisingly personal, and I was flattered my respondents trusted me so much. One of the most poignant responses that stuck with me was:


The hardest worker in my family growing up was profoundly unhappy. Partially for others reasons (trauma), partially because he placed all of his self-worth in "doing" rather than "being".


After grouping my documented needs, I discovered by far the largest type of needs users have concerning money is of an emotional nature.


(Rotating photos represent a cross-section of the user group surveyed)

I started out our research for this case study reviewing user personas, needs, and developing identities based on a 30 participant study I conducted. The responses were surprisingly personal, and I was flattered my respondents trusted me so much. One of the most poignant responses that stuck with me was:


The hardest worker in my family growing up was profoundly unhappy. Partially for others reasons (trauma), partially because he placed all of his self-worth in "doing" rather than "being".


After grouping my documented needs, I discovered by far the largest type of needs users have concerning money is of an emotional nature.


(Rotating photos represent a cross-section of the user group surveyed)

10 and 20 us dollar bill

Challenge Accepted

20% OF MY USER RESPONSES WERE ANTI-CAPITALIST SENTIMENT. I COULDN'T HELP BUT WONDER, HOW DO WE ENGAGE THOSE IN A
SYSTEM THEY ARE FUNDAMENTALLY AT ODDS WITH?

After doing some further reading on the subject, I discovered that advertising and commercialism have managed to co-opt counter cultural means to living within society. The idea that obtaining more and more is what we are told should make us happy. Stuff in general, has become more accessible. Nobles used to obsess over things that are totally commonplace for us now, such as the colour purple in fabrics or spices.

Has over-abundance and rapid manufacturing confused our priorities? Maybe because things are so easy now, what we’re able to obtain gives us such little satisfaction.


WHAT IF WE WERE ABLE TO CELEBRATE THE LITTLE THINGS AGAIN?

The Original Idea

The first iteration of Greeen was an idea for bank account integration.

My business partner and I decided to pivot our idea because we realized as a small independent studio, it would be pretty difficult to realize a total bank account overhaul. The design also had a few issues I could not ignore.

The first iteration of Greeen was an idea for bank account integration.

My business partner and I decided to pivot our idea because we realized as a small independent studio, it would be pretty difficult to realize a total bank account overhaul.

I love seeing ideas grow, so pivoting wasn't a huge issue. I personally wanted to create something with a bit more pop, anyway. Below is a peek at the original design. I know personally, I love seeing the development of things!

Issue 1: The Old Home Page


Originally, the shade of green on each account was meant to display how close you were to your monthly financial goals. The brighter, the better, basically.


I could rant about how many times I've opened my own account with TD and been annoyed at the "MySpend" feature turning red simply because I had made a larger purchase that month (that I had planned).


But something bothered me. I wasn't really answering any needs with the home screen here. This screen is really just an artsy bank statement which helps no one.

The first iteration of Greeen was an idea for bank account integration.

My business partner and I decided to pivot our idea because we realized as a small independent studio, it would be pretty difficult to realize a total bank account overhaul.

I love seeing ideas grow, so pivoting wasn't a huge issue. I personally wanted to create something with a bit more pop, anyway. Below is a peek at the original design. I know personally, I love seeing the development of things!

Issue 2: The Aesthetic (Unfortunately)


The UI itself is flat, and the layout while nice and simple makes adding more features difficult. Users hate huge changes to UI, and the last thing I want to do is make a new feature that disrupts the entire flow of the experience.


Minimalism is great, but I found these layouts lacked the visual contrast to make it really work.

The first iteration of Greeen was an idea for bank account integration.

My business partner and I decided to pivot our idea because we realized as a small independent studio, it would be pretty difficult to realize a total bank account overhaul.

I love seeing ideas grow, so pivoting wasn't a huge issue. I personally wanted to create something with a bit more pop, anyway. Below is a peek at the original design. I know personally, I love seeing the development of things!

Issue 3: Goal Pages


I really enjoyed creating the function where you flip between your goals and accomplishments. But much like the home page, the scope of this design is lacking.


Sure, it looks great while displaying a small amount of information, but I neglected to design around the continued use of the app.

The first iteration of Greeen was an idea for bank account integration.

My business partner and I decided to pivot our idea because we realized as a small independent studio, it would be pretty difficult to realize a total bank account overhaul.

I love seeing ideas grow, so pivoting wasn't a huge issue. I personally wanted to create something with a bit more pop, anyway. Below is a peek at the original design. I know personally, I love seeing the development of things!

Easy on the Eyes

Easy on the Eyes

You log in, and the first thing you see is positive reinforcement about your life choices instead of raw numbers. Greeen helps you keep track of your goals, purchases and inspirations - no matter how small. Our app also provides agency to our users, as they can choose to learn about finance (the second largest need in my user group).

This iteration of the home screen blends my love of modern art and product design. My partner had many ideas of bonus features I could add, and unlike the old home screen they were easy to implement because of bento layout and minimal colour palette.

Overall, this home screen provides information on each of the core needs of our targeted user group. Every anxiety you have about your financial well being can be answered and analyzed in seconds.

This visual hierarchy is also a lot stronger here due to the inclusion of circular icons contrasting with the square grid, and the selective positioning of bold and heavy set type.

You log in, and the first thing you see is positive reinforcement about your life choices instead of raw numbers. Greeen helps you keep track of your goals, purchases and inspirations - no matter how small. Our app also provides agency to our users, as they can choose to learn about finance (the second largest need in my user group).

This iteration of the home screen blends my love of modern art and product design. My partner had many ideas of bonus features I could add, and unlike the old home screen they were easy to implement because of bento layout and minimal colour palette.

Overall, this home screen provides information on each of the core needs of our targeted user group. Every anxiety you have about your financial well being can be answered and analyzed in seconds.

This visual hierarchy is also a lot stronger here due to the inclusion of circular icons contrasting with the square grid, and the selective positioning of bold and heavy set type.

Screen 1: Our delightfully modern home page.



Screen 2: The "Punch Card" (explained in further depth next!)

Screen 3: Saved Receipts


A good finance app should help you keep track of your actual purchases. Later down the line, we reworked this function from being based entirely on user input to a computer-vision system that scans purchase receipts and inputs them for you.

Screen 4: Metrics


We wanted to show users more than the raw numbers of their spending and saving. A lot of people simply become paralyzed when looking at a spreadsheet, so our metrics screen breaks it down visually.


Say you're eating out more instead of saving money at home. All you need to do to understand this is look at your spending heat map - instead of wading through paper.

The Punch Card

The Punch Card

The hero function of this app really is the combination of our punch card and the treats gallery. Every time the user completes personal finance goals, they earn tokens.

Once you complete a full stamp card of 15 tokens, you're reminded to treat yourself to a little something. After all, you've been working hard. You've earned it!

The app then asks, what did you treat yourself with? And the user is prompted to take a picture of it. It lives with all your accomplishments, reminding you that you are indeed, someone who is capable of curating their life and dreams.

The hero function of this app really is the combination of our punch card and the treats gallery. Every time the user completes personal finance goals, they earn tokens.

Once you complete a full stamp card of 15 tokens, you're reminded to treat yourself to a little something. After all, you've been working hard. You've earned it!

The app then asks, what did you treat yourself with? And the user is prompted to take a picture of it. It lives with all your accomplishments, reminding you that you are indeed, someone who is capable of curating their life and dreams.

USER JOURNEY MAP

Adventures in MarKeting

Adventures in MarKeting

While working on this project, I also picked up learning motion design for the creation of marketing material.

This was my first try at marketing a product as a founder. We launched the MVP with an initial content push and paused there as priorities shifted. A good lesson in scoping a solo/small-team launch realistically.

The Conclusion

The Conclusion

Post-launch, we fixed the ad load to something less punishing and added swipe-back navigation. Small things, but they mattered. Most of our post-MVP time went into squashing bugs, since this was Patryk's first time building for Android.

Once things stabilized, we called it: he went to go build an actual house in Poland, and I moved on to other projects. Greeen remains a live piece of my portfolio, and a project I'd happily pick back up.

Would you liKe another?

NEXT UP:

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