Vegan Restaurant - Product Design
Enjoy a new experience in your favourite vegetarian restaurant.
OVERVIEW
Design a software for a vegetarian restaurant connecting the client with the cook working in the kitchen reducing time and optimising the process. This project was part of a Design Challenge. I had 5 days to define, design a solution and create a presentation to show my work.
The challenge was to create an user interface that can be used in a kitchen. Add value to the restaurant and managers and also answer all the user needs in the process.
DAY 1
First day the main thing was to understand.
Understand who are the users. In this case the software was for the restaurant so the user was the cook in the kitchen but I had to add value to the manager and the final customer.
Understand their needs: They have to deal with the software and cook at the same time. They need the ingredients, allergies, what is in the order and ingredient stock. Even the time the order was placed.
Understand the context: The interface has to work in a kitchen so it has to be easy to interact.
Understand competitors: I checked the process in apps like Glovo or Deliveroo to check the steps the user needs to order food and how to translate that to our restaurant.
The first decision was to established what kind of restaurant would be, so I chose a POKE RESTAURANT where the ingredients can be mixed as you want with some options predefined and the kitchen doesn’t have any hot area. My strategy would be to install tablets in the kitchen, so every cook had his own device. The tablets are a easy-to-use device with touch screen that can be cleaned easily, so I would design the interface for a tablet resolution in a landscape format.
I sketched a workflow to understand the process:
DAY 2 & 3
Diverge and decide.
After ideating a couples of ideas and develop some solutions, I chose the best fit based in these key points:
The interface has to be designed for two types of users: Managers and Cooks as they don’t have the same needs.
The cook has two interactions and the idea is to connect the cook directly with the user, so each interaction send a push notification to user mobile.
I decided to create a specific screen for the restaurant manager: It has been divided in four key areas, one is a must for the MVP (Orders) and the other three were presented as Nice to have:
Orders: with a lot of information about orders to answer any customer call and to be aware of any problem in the kitchen.
People: with the info about who works in the restaurant and how many cooks are available.
Sales: Screen with business numbers and sales in real time.
Stock: To manage stock and allow manager to order to restaurant provider.
The other main section was for cooks.: This screen has been designed just for tablets, but it will adapt to mobile too for a future integration. It has the info about the order, the estimated time of cooking and the two interaction buttons START and COMPLETED. It also offers the option to take a break and to ask for more stock of a missing ingredient.
Screen for a manager with a list of orders and their estatus, list of employees working and a notification area where the manager can see the orders ready to collect.
Managers can see every order and check them as COLLECTED (only the ones are ready) or CANCELED. The option to be edited it´s in the client app and not after an order is being prepared.
Screen for cooks with the option to star and complete the order and the estimated time of cooking.
First screen of missing stock journey for cooks to inform their managers.
I also designed a few screens of the client app to help me during the presentation with stakeholders and the idea of receiving push notifications when the cook change check the order is ready and it’s in preparation..
DAY 4 & 5
Prototype and Test.
I created this prototype in Invision to use in my presentation and see the interactions. This is the link.
In the last day I had to work in a presentation to discuss with stakeholders and test the idea.
SUMMARY
It was a hard test because I was alone and the time frame was short.
I am team player and I prefer to discuss ideas with colleagues and have more time for testing.
The feedback was very positive and the idea was simple but effective. The like the UI and the UX was easy to implement and cover every need. The presentation was cleaned and well explained and it opened the meeting for a debate and ideas of how to improve the process.