The Ellen MacArthur Foundation had a bold vision: catalyse the entire food industry to build better food systems based on circular economy principles. The scale was unprecedented - 57 global producers, start-ups, suppliers and retailers across multiple markets and languages. Resulting in 141 products designed to regenerate nature.
There was no existing digital infrastructure to support this complexity. We needed to create an entire ecosystem from scratch. A transformative 2-year initiative (2023-2025). This being a pilot that future challenges would depend on.
Instead of building isolated solutions, we designed an interconnected digital ecosystem that could flex across the entire challenge lifecycle. The breakthrough was creating modular, reusable components that could be rapidly deployed for future iterations - turning this pilot into a scalable template for global impact.
As the key digital designer, I worked cross-functional and collaborated across Food, Communications, LatAm, Brand and Technical teams through the three distinct phases: Design Submission, Production, and Market Showcase. Each phase required different digital touchpoints that seamlessly connected through integrated data flows.
Experience design for creation of challenge form, digital marketing coordination, event platform development, website design and low-code solution architecture with both internal and external engineering teams for two key products (retail catalogue and product showcase site Nature In Mind), which was linked to from 6+ major retailers including Carrefour Brasil, Waitrose, and Fortnum & Mason.
Nature in Mind Platform - Multi-language showcase for 141 products with advanced search and retail integration
Retailer Catalogue System - Low-code solution enabling retailer-supplier connections
Foundation Website - Immersive storytelling and knowledge hub
Event Registration System - Activation for premium showcase event
Challenage Playbook - Developed the full Challenge playbook in Notion, meaning easy onbaording to participants and wider team able to make edits when needed, removing dependencies on individuals.
Community Platform - I helped create assets used on the specially developed platform for participant to engage and learn throughout the challenge lifecycle
Measurement Infrastructure - Multi-language data collection feeding directly into scoring systems
The ecosystem handled massive complexity across diverse contexts:
141 products successfully showcased across integrated digital platforms. 57 global participants guided through comprehensive digital journey. 6+ major retailers connected through catalogue system. Multi-market presence spanning three continents.
I feel the success of this project, was that it demonstrated and proved that the food system can be disrupted where products are designed with circular economy principles.
From a digital perspective the ultimate collaborative project. We weaved our practices across every touchpoint in the challenge lifecycle.