When Snap announced that Snapchat would be redesigned to make it easier to use, it sounded like a good idea. Unfortunately the end result was anything but, and caused a lot of users to be frustrated with the app where some of them even launched a petition to bring back the old design.Snap has since caved and have been rolling back to some of the older designs, but as it turns out this could have been a fumble that the company could have avoided in the first place. According to a report from The Information (paywall; via Engadget), Snap’s designers warned the company’s CEO Evan Spiegel against releasing the new design, claiming that during the pre-testing, the feedback wasn’t very positive and that engagement metrics dropped.
The publication also claims that Spiegel had given the company’s engineers a short timeframe to complete the redesign, and did not consult on design or engineering executives about the new functionality or its intended goal. However like we said, things appear to be back on track with some of the older design elements making a comeback.
However apparently the redesign of the redesign were made by Snapchat’s designers themselves, not by Spiegel, although naturally he was the one that oversaw and approved said changes. In an email sent to The Information, Spiegel wrote, “There is no doubt that collaboration yields better results :)”