Kevin Liu, Designer

Kevin Esmael Liu

TL;DR

$20M in value—and that's annually.
Tested and proven in 5 weeks.

CarMax was losing ~$11.8 million a year from vehicle inspections. This was an intern-led initiative to explore a solution in only 5 weeks.

I led all aspects of design to prove out this product—every UI deliverable and design process artifact you see here was produced by me. Not only did I find an elegant solution, but proved it to leadership (up to the VP-level) and secured buy-in from all stakeholders.

As the sole product designer on this project, I worked closely alongside the product manager intern to imagine a new inspection system under a lean, product-led approach. But achieving our high-impact goal in this timeframe still meant high-frequency, intensive collaboration with process engineers, developers, users, and other designers.

Despite not having any researchers, collecting data to prove my concept worked was a non-negotiable, so I ensured rigorous, iterative testing was a core part of our strategy.

ROLE

Lead Product Designer (Intern)

TOOLS

Figma, UserTesting, Figma Slides (Presenting to Leadership)

TIMELINE

5 Weeks, 2024

% of CarMax' Net Income (FY 2024)

% Increase in Inventory Throughput (KPI)

Paul Janney
Senior Manager, Product Design
"The contributions Kevin made were tremendous on both the discovery and design front and will no doubt help assist those teams in their missions as they look to solve key problems for their customers. Also, really enjoyed seeing his work in Figma. Advanced, and even basic prototyping, is something our organization is continuing to learn and he helped raise the bar."
Chris Henderson
Senior Manager, Visual Systems Design
"Working with Kevin amazing! He wasn't an intern to me, he was a valuable member of the product org. He came prepared and ready to ask questions, as well as give feedback when he wasn't presenting his work. I would be more than confident if Kevin was leading the design and discovery of a product team at CarMax. We'd be lucky to have Kevin back once his journey with school is complete, but I'm sure the world will be his oyster when he takes that next step in his professional career. Anyone would be lucky to have Kevin's work ethic, team player mentality and skill on their team."
Ginny Taylor
Senior Product Designer
"I was super impressed with Kevin's maturity, willingness to contact people and initiate work, and just overall be a great part of the team. I knew that if Kevin said he was going to make something, it would get done, and the results would be exceptional. In CarMax competency terms, Kevin has excellent teamwork and analysis & decision-making skills. He was able to execute a range of design iterations, using designer critiques, stakeholder feedback and user testing to push these iterations further."
Lily Taylor
Product Manager Intern
"Kevin was an excellent designer! We did discovery together and talked about direction, and he pulled off all of execution by himself. He collaborates well, is a natural at design, and incorporates feedback quickly into rapid prototyping."
Eric Martin
VP, Product Design
"Great presentation. I'm excited about the acceleration this provides our future sales ops/merchandising products!"