Overview.

HackDavis is the largest collegiate hackathon in California. Our design project for the hackathon was driven by their mission to create for social good. We developed a functional website that bridged the gap between local restaurants and locals of Davis, CA, addressing the critical issues of food waste and food insecurity. Our platform enabled restaurants to give away unsold meals that would otherwise go to waste, while also providing those in need with a reliable source of nourishment. This project not only aligned with our commitment to sustainability and equity but also intended to have a direct and positive impact on our local community, offering a practical solution to reduce food waste and support individuals facing food insecurity.

Our project was a dynamic, 24-hour collaborative effort that brought together a team of two coders and I, as the lead UI/UX Designer. Despite the time constraints, we were able to develop a fully functioning website that seamlessly connected local restaurants and community members. This experience showcased the power of teamwork, as we leveraged each team member's unique skills and helped each other out in our respective skills, to create a solution that addressed food insecurity and food waste. The sense of urgency and shared commitment to our mission fueled our creative process, resulting in a successful and impactful project that highlighted the potential for technology to drive positive change in our communities.

For: HackDavis 2022

Role: Lead UI/UX Designer

Team: Beam Teacharuangchit, Sejal Karanjkar

Duration: 24 Hours

Tools: Figma, Procreate, Google Cloud Firebase, HTML, CSS 

Awards: Best Campus Living Hack

Research.

In the face of tight deadlines, our team embarked on a rapid ideation process, driven by a deep sense of purpose and a profound understanding of our local community's needs. Our motivation was grounded in well-researched data from UC Davis, which revealed a concerning trend: the prevalence of food insecurity had been on the rise, with 44% of undergraduate students experiencing this hardship in 2018. Additionally, findings from Feeding America underscored the magnitude of the issue, reporting that over 20,000 residents in Davis were grappling with food insecurity. This compelling research highlighted the urgency of our mission and inspired our project's focus on creating a solution that could directly address the pressing issue of food waste while providing much-needed support to those facing food insecurity in our community.

What It Does.

This web application allows local restaurant owners and food distributors in Davis the opportunity to list their meals at the end of the day that were not eaten and would have to be thrown out otherwise. These meal posts then become visible to those in need around Davis. The receivers can view the options and claim a meal for the day! Both the distributors and receivers have access codes provided to them, giving them access to this platform. These access codes prevent the distribution of food from unsafe vendors, and ensure that this platform primarily remains a resource to those in need. In addition, to keep the meals from being claimed by one user, each user can claim one meal each day. We hope to reach as many people as possible with our software, and designed Food Redemption with this caveat in mind.

How We Made It.

Our design process was crafted to ensure the seamless functionality and user-friendly experience of our website. I kicked off this process by quickly designing and prototyping a preliminary version of the website using Figma. I created a base design that was then given to our coders to be developed, soldifying the navigation of the site along with design choices such as typography and the color palette. I also designed our logos and illustrations using Procreate, to create a more personal touch. 

For the front-end development, our coders utilized React.js, due to its versatility and robust capabilities. This choice allowed us to create a responsive and dynamic user interface, ensuring an engaging and intuitive user experience. I collaborated closely with the developers to build the front end using JavaScript, HTML, and CSS, combining these technologies to bring our design to life.

To ensure the reliability and scalability of our data management, we turned to Google Cloud Firebase. By storing all user data in Firebase, we built a foundation for our website, capable of handling varying data loads while maintaining data integrity. This comprehensive approach to design and development enabled us to create a functional and reliable platform that fulfilled our mission to connect restaurants with the community, addressing food waste and food insecurity in Davis. 

Design. 

Preliminary Designs on Figma.

In order to get our design process started, I quickly designed the framework for our website, including our landing page and homepage, the explore page to find available food, as well as a donor and receiver login page. During this process, I also solidified the design system, such as typography and color palette that represented the way we wanted our website to best be displayed—welcoming and inviting to all. 

Final Product. 

Our final product can be viewed below! By the end of our 24-hour sprint, our team was able to create a fully functioning website that tackled food insecurity and food waste in the Davis community. 

Conclusion.

Many of our team members were new to hackathons, making this experience an invaluable opportunity for us to gain an understanding of the web application development process at such a fast pace. We were able to see our project get turned into a working website from a design in just 24 hours. We take pride in successfully crafting a clear and fully interactive web application that holds the potential to significantly benefit our community.

Looking ahead, our vision for this platform includes enhancing its functionality by implementing features such as email confirmation receipts for claimed meals and a user-friendly system for reporting unsatisfactory food. Furthermore, we aspire to extend our impact to the broader Sacramento area, aiming to offer secure meals to more individuals in need while giving additional restaurants the opportunity to contribute their surplus food, thus reducing waste.

••••••••

Built with love in the PNW🫶🏼