Heineken Vietnam: Beer Delivery E-commerce

Designing a Swift, Seamless E-Commerce Experience for Ice-Cold Beer

Client Overview

Heineken is one of the world’s most recognisable beer brands, with a strong presence in Vietnam. In Ho Chi Minh City, however, counterfeit beer was a growing problem, threatening consumer trust and brand integrity.

To address this, Heineken launched its own e-commerce platform, promising to deliver authentic, ice-cold beer to customers within 60 minutes.

Project Overview

The e-commerce platform was designed not only to protect Heineken’s brand but also to redefine convenience in beer ordering. In line with the brand’s promise of “fast and cold,” the digital experience needed to mirror that same speed, authenticity, and simplicity.

The client’s chosen platform was Drupal Commerce, which meant our design solutions had to be both user-centric and technically compatible with its capabilities.

The Challenge

• Counterfeit beer eroded consumer trust and loyalty.
• Heineken needed to establish an official, reliable channel that guaranteed authenticity.
• The user journey had to be swift and intuitive, ensuring customers could order their beers in seconds.
• Designs had to remain scalable and feasible within Drupal Commerce’s framework.

Scope

• User experience (UX) design and user journey mapping
• Collaboration with a UI designer for interface design
• Prototyping and validation of a fast, intuitive ordering flow
• Ensuring design feasibility and optimisation within Drupal Commerce
• End-to-end design delivery through to website launch

Approach

In the spirit of Heineken’s “fast and cold” promise, the UX was built around speed, clarity, and minimal friction:

• Quick Add on Product Listings
  Customers could add quantities directly from the product listing page without navigating away.
  
• Checkout Shortcut
  A “Checkout Now” button was placed prominently, allowing immediate purchase.
• Two-Step Confirmation
  The checkout flow was streamlined into just two steps, dramatically reducing drop-offs.

Throughout the process, I collaborated with the UI designer and development team to ensure the designs were fully compatible with Drupal Commerce, balancing clean layouts, bold CTAs, technical feasibility with an intuitive navigation and seamless user experience.

Deliverables

• User journey flows and wireframes
• UX design for product listing, checkout, and order confirmation
• Collaboration on final UI design and Drupal implementation
• End-to-end design delivery for website launch

Outcome

The platform delivered a swift, seamless beer-ordering experience that reinforced Heineken’s brand promise of fast, authentic, and ice-cold delivery.

By minimising friction in the ordering journey and ensuring technical feasibility with Drupal Commerce, the website encouraged adoption while strengthening consumer trust in the official Heineken channel.

What I Learned

• Design and technology must align. Working within Drupal Commerce required close collaboration with developers to translate UX ideas into scalable solutions.
• Digital can reinforce brand values. Translating “fast and cold” into a speedy UX made the brand promise tangible.
• Small optimisations drive big impact. Features like “add on listing” and checkout shortcuts improved speed and reduced drop-offs.
• Collaboration sharpens design. Partnering with a UI designer and dev team ensured usability, aesthetics, and feasibility worked hand in hand.