An events app for a co-op coming home.
MEC Connect
What if your next outdoor adventure started with a new friendship? Built with Mountain Equipment Company to rebuild community engagement.
Final concept · MEC Connect
A co-op that lost
its sense of community.
MEC was founded as a Canadian co-operative rooted in environmental values and community. In 2020 US-based Kingswood Capital acquired it over loud member protest. In 2025 Canadian owners 3F Capital bought it back.
Three eras, two ruptures, and a lingering trust gap with the people who used to call MEC theirs.
Eleven conversations,
three patterns.
Retail customers, store staff, and longtime members.
A legacy trust gap
Long-time customers and ex-co-op members felt MEC had lost its mythology, community, and identity through the corporate years.
Beginners had nowhere to start
Newcomers felt overwhelmed and unsure where to begin, despite MEC’s reputation as a place that welcomes them.
A strong but hidden community
Loyal customers existed, but lacked visibility or any real way to connect with each other.
“We host events to keep people connected. Community is a big part of what MEC stands for.”
MEC store staff · our north star
Process deck · ethnography → reframe
MEC Connect, an events app
that puts community first.
Events are how MEC’s community actually shows up. But they were buried, hard to find on the website, easy to miss on Instagram, invisible in store. MEC Connect is a dedicated events app.
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Discover
Surfaced by location, community, and adventure type, with QR entry from in-store signage.
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Connect before the event
Opt-in group chat with other attendees, so newcomers don’t show up alone.
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Earn & belong
Fire Safety, Tent Technician, and Hiking Expert badges, tied to MEC’s heritage rather than points farming.
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Community feed
Ambassadors, announcements, and post-event posts that make MEC’s hidden community visible again.
Six key screens · MEC Connect
Spike’s first event,
step by step.
Spike just moved to Vancouver. He’s an avid trail runner who knows no locals.
He scans a QR code at his nearest MEC store, finds the We Run the Cold event, RSVPs, and opts into the pre-event group chat, arriving with new friends already lined up.
Storyboard · Spike’s first event
Three people,
three reasons MEC matters.
Personas and journeys for the people most affected by MEC’s identity shift.
- George, a backcountry pro nostalgic for the co-op years.
- Piper, a sustainability-minded gear enthusiast after clear answers.
- Spike, a newcomer to Vancouver looking to find community through the outdoors.
Persona · Backcountry Pro · George
Journey map · Piper · looking beyond the label
From store shelf to website to competitor research, revealing where information breaks down for value-driven customers.
A real client,
not a hypothetical brief.
We shaped the solution around MEC stakeholders’ input rather than designing in isolation, balancing user needs, brand identity, feasibility, and business goals inside real organizational constraints, not a conceptual student brief.
Team · on-site at MEC HQ
Presenting the concept at MEC
What I owned
in this collaboration.
Research
- Research synthesis from direct MEC collaboration
- Translating stakeholder needs into product opportunities
- UX problem framing
Strategy & vision
- Community / event experience strategy
- Final product direction
Design artifacts
- Persona development
- Journey mapping
- Concept ideation
- Storyboarding
Facilitation
- Workshop activities with the team and stakeholders
What I took
from MEC.
Designing alongside MEC showed me how product decisions become stronger when they are informed by real stakeholder context, not just assumptions.
Every choice had to earn its place against MEC’s brand identity, feasibility, and how community actually forms around events.