the gift of giving (and receiving)

Digital Gifting

Problem

Customers often didn’t have recipients’ addresses when gifting, leading to failed deliveries (1.08% vs 0.76% for non-gifts). Customers also wanted to preserve surprise — but Amazon’s process often spoiled it.

My Role

As lead designer partnering with the Seattle delivery team:

  • Defined the strategy of addressless gifting via email/phone.

  • Advocated for digital “unwrapping” as a delight moment.

  • Balanced user delight with logistics accuracy.

Execution

  • Designed recipient notifications and address entry flows.

  • Prototyped unwrapping animations and ran iterative tests.

  • Coordinated with engineering to ensure privacy and surprise preservation.

Outcomes & Impact

  • Reduced delivery errors by enabling recipient-controlled addresses.

  • Widely adopted feature, boosting customer satisfaction with gifting.

  • Strengthened Amazon’s positioning as a surprise-friendly gifting platform.

Strategic Takeaways

  • Solve for emotional jobs-to-be-done (surprise, delight) as well as functional.

  • Partnership across orgs (Berlin + Seattle) is critical for global-scale features.