cravin

OVERVIEW

Amongst people who are often on the road, finding quality food options that are timely and accessible is a common issue.

Cravin allows users to filter and find restaurants for food pickup or dine-in en route to their predetermined destination. The app optimizes the pickup time by ensuring that the drive to the restaurant closely matches the wait time for food preparation.

USER DISCOVERY

Stuck on the road

My team and I first conducted six in-depth interviews with commuter students at USC to understand the core problems they face in terms of time management. Although our first assumption was that people who spend hours commuting in LA traffic have difficulty organizing their time, we discovered a more pressing issue instead: being on the road during meal times.

What do you struggle with the most when commuting?

1. Eating

2. Arriving on time/traffic

3. Having free time

4. Stress

Once we noticed the pattern, we dove deeper into the issue.

HYPOTHESIS

Current food pick up options are time consuming, especially for those often in a rush to go from one place to another and who often choose unhealthy fast food options or go hungry.

The Problem

Current Process

Find a restaurant on current route

Search restaurants on food apps for additional details

Call or order on the restaurant’s platform

Wait for food or receive cold food upon arrival

With so many steps, finding and ordering food en route to a destination is inefficient.

the goal

To create an en route food ordering platform that allows users on the go to pick up their food with no additional wait time.

IDEATION

Survey Findings

To build our user profiles and understand their concerns, we reached out to potential users through various channels, including Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn. We collected 74 responses through a survey conducted via Google Forms. Our respondents ranged from USC students to delivery drivers.

How do you decide on where to eat?

"Whatever is near me"

"Places with a drive-thru"

"The cheapest option"

"Whatever I'm in the mood for"

Are there any apps you use?

52%

Google Maps

29%

Yelp

19%

Food Delivery Apps (Grubhub, UberEats, etc.)

Revisiting User and Restaurant Pain Points

1. High User and Restaurant Fees

2. Lack of optimization

3. Limited restaurant discovery

From the obtained data through our survey, we were able to identify critical pain points in the current method for restaurant search and understand our users' needs clearly. The data also gave additional insights into necessary features that would set us apart from other food apps.

Competitive Landscape

yelp

various food locations discovery options

recommended options are not on user's route

doesn't address time optimization problem

google maps

"add a stop" function

limited restaurant discovery features

lacks a centralized ordering system

DoorDash, Grubhub, & UberEats

limited takeout options

no recommendations of restaurants en route

Early Iterations

After finishing up the mid-fidelity screens, I sent out an additional survey to test the usability and intuitiveness of Cravin. Because it fits into the food delivery app category, I wanted to keep it consistent and standard.

Final Product

Core Functionalities

home page

See what's popular near you, different Cravin partners, and your progress bar for collecting points.

en route discovery

Enter your destination, filter by preference, view various restaurants as a list or on the map.

place order

See ratings for each restaurant in 3 different categories, browse pictures and ratings for menu items, and place your order!

pickup & Rating

Pickup your food when you arrive and submit ratings for the restaurant and individual menu items to redeem points to redeem in the future.

My Takeaways

Problem-Centric Designs

"The simplest and easiest form of prototyping is a conversation."

‍- Designing Your Life, Bill Burnett & Dave Evans

We approached our target users assuming their main problem revolved around timeliness and scheduling, but through our interviews, we identified a more pressing common issue among users who are frequently on the road - the challenge of finding quality and timely food options.

Collaborative Ideation

My team and I had collaborative brainstorming sessions to generate innovative ideas for improving our users’ experience. By doing this, I wanted to encourage creativity through cross-functional dialogue by having developer perspectives as well.

Looking Forward

Next steps

enhance personalization

Implement more advanced personalization features, such as user-specific restaurant recommendations and customizing the user interface based on individual preferences.

Partnerships and integrations

Explore partnerships with restaurants, payment gateways, or other relevant platforms to offer users more seamless and diverse experiences.

what about the restaurants?

To integrate the app with partner restaurants for receiving order, we can develop an app or web-based portal that allows restaurants to receive and manage incoming orders. This would also include providing training and support to these restaurants so they can efficiently use this system.