FoodUp is an aggregation mobile application to standardise both the users' experience and usage across restaurants.
Challenge statements at http://www.fnbtechhackathon.com/.
- Off-loading ordering services to user without heavy upfront costs on equipment (iPads or fixed tablets at tables).
- Reducing waiting time for a customer to have his/her food delivered by cutting away the need for placing an order and making payments.
Existing in-house developed solutions are driven by business case. They are developed specifically for the theme or use of the restaurant. This, however, does not guarantee user satisfaction. Users prefer to do the least amount of learning. Every application to optimise worker efficiency are not in the customer's best interest. By having an aggregated application with a majority of F&B outlets participating, this builds consistency in user experience, which can be better improved through analytics. It will be too difficult to do the same as an industry standard for in-house expertise.
Furthermore, this does not necessitate a POS system. An owner can choose to maintain both screen of orders from their own POS and FoodUp. While there may be increased confusion in the kitchen, it greatly reduces the load required at the front of the house.
To the user, adopting this technology is in essence the same as fixed iPad solutions, minus the upfront costs. It is actually much easier to browse the menu and decide even while queuing or making their way to the restaurant.
So why would users download the application in the first place?
There's a tendency for user inertia. Lack of incentives for adoption tends to develop towards this stage. On our end, we will be promoting marketing efforts for the platform, offering discounts and vouchers at restaurants when they pay using the application, with all marketing costs on us.
We retain our user base through creating a seamless, standardised and a great user experience. This helps to ensure our application is consistently used, regardless of the restaurant they are at, so long as the restaurant is a participating partner. User experience design can be constantly evolved through iteration, focus groups, and user feedback.
We will be charging a nominal fee from restaurants for using our application. There will be no costs on the end user, but their geolocation may be used to allow users to bid for push notifications to users on our application during peak hours.