Client Website - Research

Okay, time to get up to date on my blog. So sorry I've been ignoring blog, I've been very busy.

Before I started working on the mockups, I did a little research on the competition. Here's a summary of some of the websites I looked at and my impressions;

Grainge Jams (http://www.graingejams.com.au/index.htm)

The Exotic Jam Factory (http://www.exoticjam.com.au/jam_factory/index.html)

I was seeking out some local small businesses similar to Monica’s to see what the competition was doing. Not surprisingly, there weren’t that many out there and I only managed to locate two. I can’t say that they’ve influenced my design, but they have convinced me not to be so boring.

The Exotic Jam Factory website is dull, and does nothing to interest me and possibly anyone else. I feel it was a bare bones task to make and all that was asked of whoever designed it was the bare minimum to get his business on the web.
Grainge Jams is little has a nicer layout, a little more interactivity, and better use of colour. But I’m not sure I’d use blues and greys when talking about food. I would think that websites about food would use more vibrant colours, and invoke some hunger feelings in the viewer.

Ozganics (http://www.ozganics.com.au/index.shtml)

Organic Road (http://www.organicroad.com.au/)

Organic Food (http://www.organicfood.com.au/)

With these sites I was looking at ways that other companies advertise their all natural food products. Monica’s jams are also organic and it would be wise to emphasize that quality. These websites work for businesses with a much larger target audience and capacity than Monica’s website will, but they can still be used for style ideas.

Ozganics is a nice website, with good layout and navigation. Colour is much more apparent with on this site, but I wonder if that many colours is necessary? Again I ask if blue is a wise choice for advertising food. Also, I’m not I like the font of the content. It looks a little like Times New Roman without the serifs, and I hate that font. It looks too technical.

Organic Road is a beautiful site. The colour scheme is simple but effective. Use of white space gives the impression of clarity and purity, important for all natural foods, while the green gives an organic, natural feeling. Great navigation, nice typography, this is a well made site.

OrganicFood.com.au is very similar in appearance to Organic Road. Whether this is intentional or not it sort of defines a theme for these websites. There are notable differences, like the banner and navigation. Organic Food got a little fancier with the presentation. The design of the navigation bar is inspired, a technique I may mimic for Monica’s website. The uneven appearance of the link buttons and underlining is interesting. It gives a sort of untamed nature feel, again working on that whole organic and natural angle.

Naturally Good Food (http://www.naturallygoodfood.co.uk/)

This is the only site I’ve reviewed that is from oversees. I was focusing on Australian sites mostly because they are more likely to represent views and beliefs from our culture. But Naturally Good Food is exactly what I’ve come to expect from health food sites. While a little more structured than some of the other sites, it stills runs with a predominantly white space and green colour scheme.