Project Vision
The mission of VAL is to help multi-allergies users to find the right restaurants easily. It provides a powerful filter that includes a variety of ingredients, in-app community reviews, and artificial intelligence food recognition features.
Top 3 Issues
1/ Filtering multiple allergies is a complicated and time-consuming process
2/ People are unsure if the restaurant could offer customized dishes that meet their allergies requirements
3/ It takes efforts to remember the restaurant and food lists that fit their diet restriction
2/ People are unsure if the restaurant could offer customized dishes that meet their allergies requirements
3/ It takes efforts to remember the restaurant and food lists that fit their diet restriction
The Problem
People who have food allergic or special food diet have a hard time to find a suitable restaurant for them. Especially for the individual who has multiple allergies, he or she has to be very careful and conscious while they eat outside. The current services for filtering allergen in restaurants bring inconvenience and difficulties when ordering food.
Observation
Most of allergy-prone diners have to
・Check the menu online before deciding the restaurant
・Call the restaurant to confirm the details (e.g. ingredients and allergen kits)
・Most of the waiters or cashiers don’t know the exact answer
・Unclear menu information
・Check the menu online before deciding the restaurant
・Call the restaurant to confirm the details (e.g. ingredients and allergen kits)
・Most of the waiters or cashiers don’t know the exact answer
・Unclear menu information
Research Insights
To understand how users decide what to eat, I conducted a survey to know what challenges they meet while choosing the restaurant.
Even if there are several dining and restaurant apps in the current market, they are not enough for users' needs.
Solution
User Persona
User Journey
Information Architecture
Low-fidelity Prototyping
Prototype
Features
Taste Preference
The user can select their diet preference while creating the account. VAL provides several allergy options for them to match their diet restrictions.
AI Ingredients Recognition
With the in-app scanning function, users can edit the ingredients note conveniently to the in-app community reviews. By the way of browsing others' feedback on their dining experience, new users could have more information as a reference.
Multi-allergies filter
For users who don't have an account, they could use the allergies filter while searching the restaurant. The difference between the registered user is that they need to select the allergies every time when using VAL.
Verified by VAL
The food with the "Verified by VAL" symbol means the details of ingredients are checked by VAL's professionals, who are either nutritionists or doctors. Users can apply the sorting function to find the foods verified by VAL.
