Redesigning search for a multisport catalogue

Product Design Lead · 2024 – 2026

The case in 30 seconds

The challenge: In early 2024, buycycle sold bikes, and the app offered a handful of categories. Two years later, the catalogue holds more than 200 sub-categories, up from 9, and reaches into components and sports gear. In the app, about seven purchases in ten are now for something other than a bike. Search rested on a flow designed by an agency before I joined: two tabs, “Bikes” and “Bike parts”, then a fixed category grid and one long list of filters, the same for every product. It could not absorb that growth.
The bet: One navigation structure that takes every new sport and every new category without a redesign, and shows buyers only the filters that matter for what they are looking for.
My role: I started the redesign on my own initiative and led it with the Lead PM, from the sport-first entry to the way results are displayed.
The outcome: A journey that grows with the catalogue. A new sport or a new category slots into the existing journey, and each category comes with its own filters.

Search in the app. Tap the outlined areas to move through each screen. The current version is the one on the pre-production environment.

Enter by sport, not by product type. The two tabs, “Bikes” and “Bike parts”, give way to an entry by sport, under which every category, from complete bikes to helmets, has its place. A new sport is simply one more entry.
Filters that follow the category. Each category shows only the filters that describe it, and results open on quick filters of their own.
No finer filtering than sellers can declare. Rather than adding very precise filters for components, the product team proposed moving the filters one level up. I approved it, because a filter sellers cannot fill in risks emptying the results.
Let buyers choose between list and image. For a bike, the photo often decides the click. For a component or gear, the price, the model and a few specs matter as much. Results therefore open as a compact list that shows more products per screen, and the image view is one tap away. About one user in four tries it, and most come back to the list.