A mobile app dedicated to the vibrant, dynamic food truck
culture at the University of Virginia.
UX Designer
User Research, Competitive Analysis, Wireframing
Sept - Nov 2022 (2 month)
Figma
As part of the
Forge Wireframe
curriculum, our three-person team chose to tackle
the intricate process of ordering from UVA's beloved food
trucks.
Food truck culture thrives at UVA. However, as of recently the only
way to order from food trucks online is through Grubhub’s campus
dining feature. While some students adjusted to this new user
journey, others found it difficult for a variety of reasons. Food
truck owners, as local small businesses, are also burdened by the
high vendor fees imposed by Grubhub.
UVA students needed an intuitive, dedicated, and comprehensive
platform for ordering from the food trucks across grounds.
As part of my research, I looked at the popular food delivery apps Grubhub and Uber Eats, as well as Good Uncle, a food truck app catering towards college campuses. This research was very beneficial to help me understand the market and learn the different screens and interfaces required of food ordering apps.
Based on my market research, I conducted a SWOT analysis of our
proposed WahooWheels to better determine the real-world strengths and
weaknesses of our intended solution.
WahooWheels is unique in that it is exclusively for food trucks at UVA, with features designed specifically to make the process of ordering from food trucks easier, and a market advantage with its model of empowering small businesses.
Food trucks are a very niche use case, and users may be reluctant to download a new app and go through the onboarding process just for this use case.
There is already a big competitor, Grubhub, that UVA students use everywhere for its meal plan and Cavalier Advantage integration.
The market analysis illuminated critical insights that were key to
shaping the design of our proposed food truck app.
In the
face of established competition, our proposed app stands to offer a
specialized experience that caters specifically to and uplifts the
vibrant food truck culture at UVA. With this knowledge, we turned to
UVA students to make sure our app meets the needs and expectations of
potential users.
To get a better understanding of our user base, we sent out an initial
survey
to 22 students we knew had previous experience ordering from food
trucks on grounds.
In order to get a clearer understanding of user motivations and
uncover any pain points that our survey may have missed, I conducted
casual
interviews
with potential users about their experience ordering through Grubhub.
I asked the survey questions listed above as well as the following
additional questions:
The results of my interviews aligned closely with our survey results,
while providing valuable insight into the reasoning and unmet needs of
potential users.
[The check in process] is so buggy. They don’t give you enough instructions on where to tap and how to use it… When it gets crowded too, the tapping is annoying
I would like to order on the phone so I don't have to wait in line and can just pick it up… I eat at food trucks for the convenience, so it sucks when [the process] gets complicated.
It's not that hard to order on Grubhub, but I feel like UI is pretty bad with the food trucks.
It feels like Grubhub wasn’t built for food trucks, they just kinda added it on. Maybe it would be nice if food trucks had their own app?
Our user research showed that the current process of ordering from
food trucks is significantly challenging for some users, as well as
uncovered some of the general feelings and specific pain points faced
by students using the existing system. This led us to following
problem statement:
UVA students require a dedicated and comprehensive platform to order from food trucks around grounds, in order to better access convenient and delicious food.
From our interviews and survey results, we saw users tend toward two distinct personas:
We developed an initial journey map that could accurately describe the food truck ordering process of both Carla and Edgar.
Based on this affinity map, two essential user stories for our proposed application emerged at the top of the hierarchy:
This section demonstrates my team's initial attempt at a design solution, from low-fidelity wireframes to a high-fidelity prototype. Figma was used as the design and collaboration tool.
While this is the initial design solution that our team arrived at,
after the conclusion of the course I decided to revisit this project
and redo the design process for the following critical reasons:
My goals for the redesign of our team’s design solution were to
address the reasons listed above, so I broke these goals down into the
following design requirements:
I decided to rework the design from scratch, starting off my process
with rough paper sketches. I continuously referred to our user
research and my goals for this redesign for the reasoning behind my
design decisions.
