FABFITFUN
Redesigning FabFitFun's cancellation flow around transparency, even when that meant pushing back on leadership.
Decreased membership cancellations by 5%
OVERVIEW
Product
FabFitFun is a consumer subscription platform offering curated lifestyle and beauty products.
Project
Redesigning the membership cancellation flow. The existing flow had many loopholes and friction over time, but leadership wanted to add more screens a retention lever, while member feedback pointed the opposite direction.
Role
Product Designer, leading the project end-to-end from discovery through launch.
Team
Product Management, Engineering, Data Analytics, and Customer Experience
Timeline
~1 month
THE PROBLEM
FabFitFun's cancellation flow had grown into a maze of loopholes over time. Leadership saw friction as a retention lever, more steps, more prompts, more chances to change a member's mind before they could actually leave. My early instinct was that this was solvable two ways at once: add more retention offers as a form of genuine empathy, while also making the flow itself transparent and frictionless.
Member feedback showed those two instincts weren't actually in tension. By the time members reached cancellation, they usually already decided they were ready to cancel. Extra steps didn't change their mind and just added frustration.
RESEARCH
What We Heard
Member feedback surfaced two consistent findings:
Existing Friction Wasn't Working
Members were vocal about the loopholes already built into the flow. By the time someone reached cancellation, they'd typically already made their decision. Extra steps didn't create reconsideration, they created frustration.
A Better Offer Mattered More than More Offers
Members said they wanted a genuinely better discount to consider before leaving, not more steps or more prompts standing between them and their choice.
CHALLENGE
Frictionless flow or leadership's retention instinct?
Leadership wanted to lean into more traditional dark UX patterns by adding more steps, more friction, to reduce cancellations. I pushed for a straightforward, frictionless flow instead.
My call: I pushed for the frictionless flow, using member feedback as the case for why more friction would backfire rather than help. Members weren't undecided by the time they reached the cancellation flow, so treating them as if they were added frustration without adding retention.
What shipped: Due to time constraints and a need to test faster, we scaled back to shipping only three retention offers rather than the full set originally designed, prioritizing speed of learning over a more complete initial launch.
DESIGN SOLUTIONS
Automated Swap for Credit
Automated the credit-swap process, removing the manual middleman step.
Live Chat with Customer Experience
Added a virtual assistant chat option for members who wanted help before finalizing cancellation.
Personalized Save Offers
Tailored each cancellation reason screen to a more relevant offer, with the option to speak to a Customer Experience rep instead.
IMPACT
Leadership's instinct was that more friction would protect against cancellations. The result said otherwise.
5%
decrease in cancellations, despite removing friction. Proof that a better offer mattered more than more obstacles.
REFLECTION
The hardest part of this project was the tension with leadership over dark patterns versus a frictionless flow. I had direct member feedback showing that friction was already a source of frustration and pushed for the more transparent, lower-friction approach instead, arguing it would serve both the member and the business better than what leadership initially wanted.
It was vital to keep the flow straightforward, transparent, and easy for members to actually go through and cancel their membership. Members consistently have a better experience and a more honest relationship with brands when the flow respects their decision. The 5% decrease was proof that transparency isn't just the more ethical choice, but it was also the more effective one.