Let's Go Back
A mobile app created for the purpose of helping college students manage their food while lessening food waste.
Figma / Fig Jam / Zoom
UX Designer / UX Researcher
4 Students
Fall 2023 / 8 Weeks
Understanding University Student's Pain Points
My team wanted to better understand university student's problems with food management. We targeted Rutgers University students, both living alone and with roommates. Everyone of these students were responsible for cooking their own meals. Students with roommates would have to share a refrigerator with someone else, adding layers to our problem.
We conducted a total of 5 interviews of Rutgers University students who lived in apartments with a refrigerator. Online, I conducted secondary research where I found other university student’s attitudes towards food management. I compiled our findings into an affinity map and found 2 key user personas.
User Research Affinity Map
Pain Points
After conducting interviews and doing user research, we were able to gain a better understanding of the problems that students faced when managing the food in their refrigerators.
While we thought that the main problem would be preventing food from going to waste, another major problem was students found themselves at a loss of how to eat more healthily and what to eat.
We focused on 2 major pain points:
1. Forgetting what is in refrigerators
Students use their memory in order to remember what is in their refrigerators. But, when a food item gets lost behind other items, students often forget what is in their refrigerator and the food expires.
Opportunity Area: How might we improve the effectiveness of the food management and organization process so food is not wasted?
2. Effective meal planning
Students often feel guilty for not eating more healthy, most have a want to eat less food that is considered junk food. Students also feel guilty when their food goes bad and they have wasted their food.
Opportunity Area: How might we increase the use of certain foods before they expire so students can feel more confident in what they are eating?
With this research, we revised our initial hypothesis: University students want a convenient and effective way to organize their refrigerators, but can’t do so because...
User Personas
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User Flow + Lo-fi Sketches:
Main Purpose of App: Organizing your fridge
1. Keeping track of what is in your fridge
The main problem for people was forgetting what food was in their fridge and when that food would expire.
2. Recipe Creation
People would get overwhelmed by the ingredients in their fridge and not know what to make with these ingredients. Knowing what to do with food is part of keeping a fridge organized.
Exploring Design Choices:
1. Camera Feature
Allows for users to streamline putting what food they have in their fridge into the app. If people have to manually put everything into the app each time they get groceries, it will make users not want to even bother.
> The idea is the app will scan the food, read the data of the expiration dates, and put that data into the app to track and remind users of when food goes bad.
2. Food Filter Feature
If a user wants to find a particular food, they can search it or use a filter to find a particular group of food.
3. Chronological Order for Expiration Dates
The main point of the app is to track food records and dates, the app will have the food that is going to expire the soonest at the top.
> Reminders can be set up so users get reminded by the app about a food about to expire.
4. Recipe Maker
User research points to people not only struggling with managing food, but knowing what to do with food. Having a database where users can input ingredients to create a recipe will help minimize food waste.
Design Kit
High Fidelity Photos
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