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Work

Experience

Contact

Work

Experience

Contact

Campus Food Ordering System

Helping college students to have smarter, cheaper food delivery

MY ROLE

UI/UX Designer

TIME

September - November 2024

SKILLS

UX Research

UX Design

Usability testing

Overview

College students often face the frustrating dilemma when it comes to food delivery: either place a large enough order to offset the high delivery fee, or pay a steep price for a small, single meal. Whether the restaurant is five miles away or just one, the delivery fees often remain the same.

The Problem ❓

College students often face a frustrating delivery experience:

Flat fees remain high regardless of order size, discouraging solo diners.

Most platforms reward larger, group orders with cost savings, students eating alone are left paying more.

The Solution (demo) 📱

Solo diners can join group orders with other students nearby.

Students can join or host the live group orders with others students (that they don't know). This helps splitting the cost between solo diners in a flexible way.
All orders have transparent delivery pricing, so students know if they’re overpaying for a short-distance delivery.

🔎 COMPETITOR ANALYSIS

To understand the market, we analyzed existing food delivery platform (UberEats, EASI, HungryPanda, DoorDash) to know more about the current experience of users.

Here, we evaluate the strengths, weakness, UX design and business models.

Key findings 🔑

Optimized for general users, overseeing the students needs.
While group order features exist, they typically assume social connections.
Users may find it difficult to understand how total costs are calculated.

🟨 AFFINITY DIAGRAMMING

To validate the ideas, I conducted user research with 16 students within my school campus to understand their needs, behaviors, and motivations.

After collecting all the data through the interviews with the target users, I sort them into groups of similar items to synthesize a comprehensive understanding the key patterns, user needs, and pain points.

Let's backtrack the process ⚙️

🔎 COMPETITOR ANALYSIS

To understand the market, we analyzed existing food delivery platform (UberEats, EASI, HungryPanda, DoorDash) to know more about the current experience of users.

Here, we evaluate the strengths, weakness, UX design and business models.

Key findings 🔑

Most apps are optimized for general users, overseeing the students needs.
While 'group order' features exist, they typically assume social connections.
Users may find it difficult to understand how total costs are calculated.

To validate the ideas, I conducted user research with 16 students within my school campus to understand their needs, behaviors, and motivations.

🚩 MAPPING PAIN POINTS

As we walk through the insights, we see the common pain points among the student users:

🧩 HOW MIGHT WE…

To move from insights to solutions, we turned each major pain point into an opportunity for solutions:

🟨 AFFINITY DIAGRAMMING

To validate the ideas, I conducted user research with 16 students within my school campus to understand their needs, behaviors, and motivations.

🚩 MAPPING PAIN POINTS

As we walk through the insights, we see the common pain points among the student users:

🧩 HOW MIGHT WE…

To move from insights to solutions, we turned each major pain point into an opportunity for solutions:

🧩 HOW MIGHT WE…

To move from insights to solutions, we turned each major pain point into an opportunity for solutions:

✏️ DESIGN ITERATIONS

I tested my design solution with the same users I interviewed with and their feedbacks allow more insights that gives valuable design iterations.

DESIGN ITERATION #1

What I tried?

A simple view list of nearby group orders that is sorted by the countdown timers until the order is closed.

What went wrong?

This helped with quick scan, however…

Not every user knows the location of the pick-up point. Users need to go to map app to search for a specific location which is overwhelming if there are multiple orders.
Users prefer to sort orders in distance rather than time windows.

DESIGN ITERATION #2

What I changed?

Added an in app map and pick up distance from user's current location.
Added the filter or sorting options (distance, time window, cost) that with the minimum number

Why it worked?

Users can scan quickly based on preferences and easily know the pick up location without the need to navigate to other apps, minimizing the process of searching.

DESIGN ITERATION #1

What I tried?

A simple view list of nearby group orders that is sorted by the countdown timers until the order is closed.

What went wrong?

This helped with quick scan, however…

Not every user knows the location of the pick-up point. Users need to go to map app to search for a specific location which is overwhelming if there are multiple orders.
Users prefer to sort orders in distance rather than time windows.

DESIGN ITERATION #2

What I changed?

Added an in app map and pick up distance from user's current location.
Added the filter or sorting options (distance, time window, cost) that with the minimum number

Why it worked?

Users can scan quickly based on preferences and easily know the pick up location without the need to navigate to other apps, minimizing the process of searching.

📦 FINAL PRODUCTS

The product turns isolated, high-cost food ordering into a collaborative, student-powered system where college diners save money and gain access to food more conveniently, even if they don't know each other.

✅ Collaborative Ordering – Students can join or host group orders with shared pickup points, making food delivery more affordable for solo diners who would otherwise pay full delivery fees.

✅ Student-Powered Delivery – Instead of relying on costly third-party drivers, students can volunteer as group hosts and earn the full delivery payout, creating a peer-based economy that benefits both the pickup volunteer and the group.

✅ Distance-Aware Transparency – Each group order displays real delivery costs, restaurant distance, and time left to join, so users can make informed, trust-based decisions based on what works best for their schedule and budget.

Moving forward, I will focus on improving the user experience across other key areas of the app, ensuring a more seamless and enjoyable end-to-end experience.

🏅 Recognized as 'Impactful Project' at University of Illinois at Chicago