A Birthday Zoo Trip That Reminded Me Why User Experience Still Feels Like an Afterthought

Today marks my son’s first birthday, a milestone that sneaks up on you with its quiet weight. One minute he’s a newborn bundle, the next he’s pulling himself up on the coffee table, grinning like he’s cracked a centuries old maths problem. To celebrate, my wife and I decided on the London Zoo, an easy choice, or so we thought. Animals, open spaces, a chance for him to point at a giraffe and babble something cute. But as I sat down to book the tickets online this morning, what should have been a simple step turned into a slog that nearly derailed the whole plan. It’s these moments that pull me back into thinking about how systems work, or don’t, and why so many organizations seem to forget the human at the center.

Let me walk you through it, because it’s the kind of everyday friction that builds up and shapes our choices in ways companies rarely notice. The website greeted me with a mandatory account creation screen right out of the gate. Not optional, not “guest checkout”, no, full registration required. Home address, email, phone number. Then the password dance: at least 12 characters, uppercase, lowercase, numbers, symbols. I get security matters, but for a toddler’s outing? It felt like unnecessary gatekeeping. Next, picking an entry time, 10 a.m. or noon, without much guidance on crowds or nap schedules for little ones. Payment? No Android Pay support, so I manually entered card details while juggling a half-asleep baby on my lap.

And it didn’t stop there. Checkboxes for marketing notifications (opt-in or out, and email vs SMS vs post), a nudge to donate extra for conservation, an invitation to join the Zoological Society for ongoing perks. By the time I hit submit, I’d second-guessed every input. Then came the address verification: confirm if the one I entered matched the one they auto-looked up from my details (it did, of course). Finally, three separate emails landed in my inbox, welcome aboard, order confirmation, and the actual e-tickets. All for a £60 family adventure.

On any ordinary day, I’d have closed the tab and pivoted to something easier, like a local park or even delivery pizza at home. But this was his first birthday. Special enough to push through the irritation. As I sat there afterward, tickets in my inbox, I couldn’t shake the feeling that this wasn’t just a clunky website. It was a symptom of a deeper misalignment in how the zoo, and so many places like it, thinks about their work.

From a systems thinking perspective, it’s fascinating how these processes emerge from interconnected parts that drift out of sync. The ticket system isn’t isolated but tied to marketing databases, CRM tools, integrations, and revenue streams. Someone upstream set a goal to boost registered users, maybe to track engagement or personalize future offers. That metric becomes a KPI, which cascades down to quarterly reviews and team bonuses. Meanwhile, the UX team, if there is one, inherits a Frankenstein of requirements: capture more data here, add this upsell there, ensure GDPR boxes are ticked. The result? A flow optimized for internal checkboxes, not the external reality of a parent racing against nap time. It’s a classic feedback loop gone awry, the system reinforces itself, prioritizing short-term signals over long-term relationships, until users like me quietly vote with our feet (or our wallets).

This ties straight into user experience design principles, which I’ve always approached as a practice in empathy mapping. Good UX isn’t about pretty interfaces; it’s about anticipating the mental model of the person on the other side. In this case, the zoo’s flow assumed I was a transactional buyer, methodically weighing options like a spreadsheet. But that’s not me, or most families. We’re in motion, emotions high, attention fragmented. The design should mirror that: reduce cognitive load, surface relevant choices, and build trust through clarity. Instead, it layered on decisions that felt extractive, give us your data, your preferences, a bit more money if you care. No wonder conversion rates suffer; it’s like inviting someone to dinner and making them chop the onions first.

Then there’s the jobs-to-be-done framework, which Clayton Christensen popularized and which resonates so much in moments like this. People don’t “hire” a product to fulfill abstract needs; they hire it for a specific job in a given context. What job was I hiring the London Zoo for? Not “view exotic animals,” though that’s the surface appeal. No, the real job was “create a memorable family bonding experience on a milestone day.” That could mean the thrill of a penguin waddle, sure, but also hassle-free logistics, age-appropriate pacing, and little surprises that make the day feel tailored. An aquarium might scratch a similar itch, or a backyard picnic with animal crackers. The zoo competes in that broader ecosystem, yet their process treated me like I was there for the lions alone, hence the heavy emphasis on conservation donations and memberships, as if animal advocacy was my core motivator.

If they’d started from the job, the entire system could realign. Imagine logging in with Google for instant familiarity, no password gymnastics. A quick selector for visit type: “Family Day with Toddler” versus “Solo Wildlife Enthusiast.” That triggers contextual help: estimated tour lengths (90 minutes for the kid-friendly loop?), animal activity peaks (monkeys perk up post-noon feedings?), and practical reassurances (yes to packed lunches; start at the east gate near the pram-friendly Tube exit). Doubts dissolve with a glance. Then, thoughtful upsells emerge naturally: a £5 birthday badge for the little one, bundled snacks to skip the queues, or a photo package capturing that first giraffe gasp. Checkout? One-tap with Android Pay. Single email: tickets, map highlights, and a “Pro Tip: Pack extra wipes” nudge. Friction minimized, value amplified.

Building this wouldn’t just be kinder; it’d be smarter. Systems thinking tells us that simpler inputs yield more resilient outputs, easier to iterate, test, and scale. UX design ensures it delights at every touchpoint, turning one-time buyers into advocates. And jobs theory? It uncovers untapped revenue: families willing to pay premiums for personalization, not because they’re generous, but because it nails the emotional payoff.

The London Zoo makes for a stark case study in how organizational silos erode user-centricity, marketing chasing lists, ops enforcing rules, execs eyeing metrics, but it’s hardly alone. We’ve all bounced off similar walls, from booking flights to signing up for newsletters. So, as I wrap up this reflection ahead of our zoo day (fingers crossed for no meltdowns), I keep circling back to one question: What’s the real cure for this epidemic of misaligned systems? Is it leadership that champions cross-functional empathy? Tools that simulate user journeys end-to-end? Or something more cultural, like tying incentives directly to lifetime value over quarterly wins? I’d love to hear your take, what’s worked in your world to keep the human job front and center?