---
title: "Cascade Ride App Redesign Proposal | Fernway Studio"
description: "Fernway Studio's pitch to redesign the Cascade Ride iOS and Android apps, fixing onboarding and churn before Denver and Minneapolis launch in September."
canonical: "https://pr-99.preview.formlio.com/documents/portland-app-redesign-proposal"
locale: "en"
type: "document"
lastModified: "2026-10-21"
alternates:
  fr: "https://pr-99.preview.formlio.com/fr/documents/portland-proposition-de-refonte-dapplication.md"
---

# Cascade Ride App Redesign Proposal | Fernway Studio

## Cascade Ride

### Make the app as easy as the bike

*Pitch · Cascade Ride*

An app redesign for Cascade Ride, ready before Denver and Minneapolis open in September.

- Prepared by: Fernway Studio, Portland
- Date: April 12, 2027
- Fee: From $168,300

*Fernway Studio*

## The idea

The best ride app is the one you forget you opened.

## The brief

### Your bikes are great. Your app is the leak.

*The brief*

You raised a $14M Series A in February to take Cascade Ride from two cities to four. The bikes are not the problem. The first week in the app is.

You asked for a redesign of the iOS and Android apps and a design system your engineers can own. Denver and Minneapolis open on September 21, and every new rider there meets the app before they meet a bike.

We think the brief undersells it. Onboarding and churn are one problem, and we would design them together. If that is wrong, tell us now.

## The numbers

### Where Cascade Ride stands

From your Amplitude and Stripe exports, trailing six months to the end of February.

### Riders in two cities

**6,200**

### Lost before first ride

**38%**

### Monthly churn today

**6.8%**

### App Store rating

**3.6**

## The data

### Where riders leave

Most of the loss happens between choosing a plan and booking delivery. That is a scheduling screen, not a pricing problem.

### Trial riders reaching each step

| Label | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Download | 100 |
| Account | 81 |
| Plan chosen | 74 |
| Delivery booked | 62 |
| First ride | 55 |

### Monthly churn

| Label | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Sep | 6.1 |
| Oct | 6.4 |
| Nov | 7.2 |
| Dec | 7.9 |
| Jan | 7 |
| Feb | 6.8 |

## Three routes

### Route A, the ride is the home screen

*App home screen with battery ring and unlock button*

### Route B, delivery in two taps

*Delivery booking screen with time slots*

### Route C, the garage

*Two phones on a deep green field*

## Past work

### We have fixed this exact leak before

Four subscription apps where the first week decided the business. Every number below is from the client's own dashboard.

### Wend Transit

- iOS and Android
- Onboarding

### Kiln Fitness

- Design system
- React Native

### Northgate Climbing

- Membership
- Booking

### Brisk Scooters

- Mobility
- Hardware pairing

## How we get there

### Twenty weeks to Denver

Kick-off Monday May 3. The new app ships to both stores on September 7, two weeks before the first Denver rider unlocks a bike.

### 1. Ride along, weeks 1 to 2

We ride with 24 subscribers, read 1,800 support tickets and sit with your dispatch team for a delivery day.

### 2. Three routes, weeks 3 to 5

Each route is a clickable prototype tested with 30 trial riders. You pick one with data, not taste.

### 3. Design system, weeks 6 to 11

Tokens and components in Figma and React Native, then onboarding, ride, swap and account flows.

### 4. Build, weeks 12 to 18

We sit in your sprints. Your engineers build, we review every pull request that touches the interface.

### 5. Ship, weeks 19 to 20

TestFlight to 200 riders, store submission, release on September 7, then a two-week watch on the funnel.

## The fee

All figures in USD. Fixed for the scope above, built from our day rates: designer $1,150, design lead $1,450, researcher $1,050. App Store and TestFlight accounts stay yours.

#### Redesign and design system

| Item | Price |
| --- | --- |
| Rider research and analytics audit | $14,850.00 |
| Three routes, prototyped and tested | $22,400.00 |
| Design system for React Native | $31,650.00 |
| Core flows | $48,300.00 |
| Build support in your sprints | $29,700.00 |
| Accessibility audit, WCAG 2.2 AA | $7,950.00 |
| Project management | $13,450.00 |

#### Optional add-ons

| Item | Price |
| --- | --- |
| Apple Watch companion | $18,600.00 |
| App Store creative | $9,450.00 |
| Post-launch iteration sprint | $12,900.00 |

## Clients

### Founders who hired us for the same problem

> They rebuilt our onboarding in six weeks and first-week activation went from 41 to 63 percent. They also told us our referral screen was pointless. It was.

— Hollis Grant, Head of Product, Wend Transit

> Our engineers kept the component library after handover and shipped two features without opening a single ticket with Fernway. That is the test of a design system.

— Ana Ruiz-Pell, CTO, Kiln Fitness

> Our rating went from 3.4 to 4.7 in one release. The part nobody else thought to design was how we answer bad reviews inside the app.

— Owen Matsuda, Co-founder, Northgate Climbing

## Approval

### Sign by April 23 and we start May 3

After April 23 the next team opening is mid-June, which puts the release after the Denver launch. We would rather say that now.

### Prepared by

**Kit Ashby**
Founder and Design Lead, Fernway Studio

1120 SE Morrison St, Portland, OR 97214
kit@fernway.studio

### For approval by

**Dana Whitlock**
VP Product, Cascade Ride

We have held Tuesday April 20 to walk your team through the routes in person.

### Start the redesign

By signing, you approve the scope and fee above: $168,300 plus any add-ons ticked, from May 3 to September 21, 2027. We invoice 40 percent on signature and hold the May 3 kick-off.