Redesigning checkout for Northwind Goods ​

Cutting a 6-step checkout down to 2, and what broke along the way.

CHANGE ME: this is an example case study. Replace it with your own, or delete it and start fresh.

The problem. Northwind's checkout was six steps long, and roughly a third of carts were abandoned somewhere between step two and step four, mostly at a mandatory account creation screen.

What changed. Guest checkout became the default, account creation moved to after the order confirmed, and the six steps collapsed into two screens: one for shipping and payment together, one for review. Nothing about the actual payment processing changed, just the number of decisions a shopper had to make before they could complete one.

The result. Cart abandonment at the account-creation step dropped by most of what it used to be. The lesson worth keeping: the account wasn't the problem, asking for it at the wrong moment was.