Meal-Planning with the Fork App

OVERVIEW

The purpose of this project was to design a technological solution to help households in the Netherlands budget more effectively when it comes to their grocery expenses. The goal was not only to help individuals save money, but also save time and cognitive energy managing their food inventory and creating weekly meal plans.

A design concept for a iOS mobile app-based solution called "Fork" was created to simplify, personalize, and streamline the meal-planning and grocery shopping process. People, both in the Netherlands and worldwide regularly grapple with the rising and inevitable cost of groceries, increased cost of living, and recurring mental burden of deciding "What are we going to eat this week?"

OVERVIEW

DEFINING THE PROBLEM

In, but not limited to, the Netherlands, a significant portion of one's earnings are systematically siphoned from one's paycheck straight into weekly grocery expenses. Buying food and making meals is an unavoidable part of life. But, this becomes ever more challenging when profit-driven supermarkets often lack transparent pricing and products diminish in size and quality (i.e., shrinkflation).

• Expenses exceed savings: In July 2021, Dutch households had an average of €21,507 in savings but faced €22,491 in deductions, resulting in -€974 in net investments per household (excluding capital like property or other investments).

• Household economic burden: A family of four (two adults under 50 and two children aged 12 and 7) spends an average of €424.76 per month on groceries, or €15.17 per day. This excludes dining out, takeaway, or fast food.

• Overall rising cost of food: Between 2010 and 2020, food prices in the Netherlands increased by 18%, with healthy food costs rising even more—by 21%. Food expenses have outpaced the inflation of other goods and services.

Dutch households are struggling to save. Stagnating wages, the rising costs of food, goods, and services, and the difficult housing market challenge many individual and household efforts to financially stay afloat and feel in control.

Despite rising costs of living, Dutch households—including citizens and legal residents—can improve their financial sustainability with better tools for budgeting, planning, and grocery management. However, several pain points make this difficult:

• Complexity of Budgeting: Crunching numbers and creating a household budget is often tedious, frustrating, and time-consuming, especially for those juggling work, studies, and caregiving responsibilities.

• Overwhelming Grocery Experiences: In-store shopping can be a sensory overload, requiring customers to navigate a flood of options, prices, and nutritional information while making sound financial decisions.

• Hurdles in Sticking to a Budget: Even after creating a budget, adhering to it remains a significant challenge for many, adding to feelings of frustration and financial strain.

DEFINING THE PROBLEM

• Hurdles in Sticking to a Budget: Even after creating a budget, adhering to it remains a significant challenge for many, adding to feelings of frustration and financial strain.

The design of the Fork iOS concept app was based on preliminary and applied research methods, testing the prototype with a small group of users both in the initial (low-fidelity) and final (high-fidelity) stages.

My role: I was the principal researcher and designer and I lead the project throughout all stages of the research and design cycle and final overseeing the final delivery | Duration: 14-Weeks | Tools: Figma, Sketch, InVision, Google Docs / Slides / Sheets

PROCESS

All aspects of this project were carried out independently in the Netherlands in fulfillment of a Prototyping course. The project included the participation of individuals living in the Netherlands, both Dutch and foreign, as part of the user interview and testing process.

PROCESS

Research Question

RQ: How can a digital solution, in the form of a mobile application or feature, be designed to help households in the Netherlands be more financially in control of their grocery shopping experience and budget more effectively?

Research Question

METHODOLOGY

1. Preliminary Research Goals

To uncover attitudes, thoughts, feelings, expectations, and values surrounding the experience of shopping and budgeting for household
groceries. Additionally the aim is to better understand people’s habits and experiences maintaining a household budget and their spending patterns on supermarket goods

2. Methods and Data Collection

Why conduct semi-structured interviews?

Uncover rich insights – Gain a mix of factual data, personal attitudes, and divers opinions
Encourage new perspectives – Empower users to share new ideas, concerns, and issues that may go unnoticed otherwise
Capture the unobservable – Gather key data on behaviors, motivations, and decision-making that can't be directly observed
Navigate complexity with flexibility – Use probing querstions to explore and elaborate on intricate topics meaningfully
Efficient and acessible – Does not require extensive training, practical and adaptable for all research experience levels

INTERVIEW STRATEGY

METHODOLOGY

1. Preliminary Research Goals

To uncover attitudes, thoughts, feelings, expectations, and values surrounding the experience of shopping and budgeting for household groceries.

Additionally the aim is to better understand people’s habits and experiences maintaining a household budget and their spending patterns on supermarket goods

2. Methods and Data Collection

Why conduct semi-structured interviews?

Uncover rich insights – Gain a mix of factual data, personal attitudes, and divers opinions
Encourage new perspectives – Empower users to share new ideas, concerns, and issues that may go unnoticed otherwise
Capture the unobservable – Gather key data on behaviors, motivations, and decision-making that can't be directly observed
Navigate complexity with flexibility – Use probing querstions to explore and elaborate on intricate topics meaningfully
Efficient and acessible – Does not require extensive training, practical and adaptable for all research experience levels

INTERVIEW STRATEGY

3. Participant selection and Recruitment

Gathered by means of convenience sampling. This means of sampling reduces the likelihood for representative results and credibility.
However, for the sake of time, it’s an easy, quick, and affordable method for gathering participants and feedback. Inclusion criteria Participants must be between the ages of 25 and 65, part of a household of two or more people, participate in grocery shopping (either in-person and/or online), and legal resident or citizen of the Netherlands, currently living in the Netherlands on a permanent basis.

METHODOLOGY

1. Manual transcription and translation of all interview data: [Image 1] Audio from all sessions transcribed verbatim into a word processing document, printed out, highlighted, and hand-annotated ➤ 2. Coding data using inductive thematic analysis: [Image 1] Identifying emergent patterns within the data using “bottom-up” approach finding naturally emerging salient elements ➤ 3. Sorting codes into thematic groups: [Image 2] Codes sorted and grouped based on similarity in order to form overarching themes to answer the research question. This can be done manually with paper Post-It notes or digitally with Miro. ➤ 4. Defining the main themes based on the sorted code groups: [Image 3] Organizing grouped codes into thematic categories. ➤ 5. Mapping out the emergent themes: Illustrating the interconnection between elements through concept mapping to visualize prominent relationships.

3. Participant selection and Recruitment

METHODOLOGY

1. Manual transcription and translation of all interview data: [Image 1] Audio from all sessions transcribed verbatim into a word processing document, printed out, highlighted, and hand-annotated

2. Coding data using inductive thematic analysis: [Image 1] Identifying emergent patterns within the data using “bottom-up” approach finding naturally emerging salient elements

3. Sorting codes into thematic groups: [Image 2] Codes sorted and grouped based on similarity in order to form overarching themes to answer the research question. This can be done manually with paper Post-It notes or digitally with Miro.

4. Defining the main themes based on the sorted code groups: [Image 3] Organizing grouped codes into thematic categories.

5. Mapping out the emergent themes: Illustrating the interconnection between elements through concept mapping to visualize prominent relationships.

RESULTS

PARTICIPANT PROFILES & QUALITATIVE INSIGHTS

Stephan – Participant 1, Male, 35-44 years old

Dutch citizen, holds a Bachelor's diploma, works as a freelance software developer, lives with his fiancé and two young children, has an average household income between €100,000 and €150,000 and is highly satisfied with his current financial situation.

“There is a lot of thinking you do during shopping like “What is the price? What is my budget? Do I need double? How much do I already have in stock at home? Will it expire?” There are a lot of micro decisions. The hard part is “Okay what is it this time? Are you hungry for pasta? Well, we already had pasta. What about the other thing? Well we still have leftovers” I wish it could be more simple. Like you have a budget and here are the recipes.

Stephan – Participant 1, Male, 35-44 years old

Louisa – Participant 2, Female, 25-34 years old

Dutch citizen, holds a Bachelor's diploma, works as a Senior Analyst, lives with her husband and one young child, has an average household income between €50,000 and €100,000 and is highly satistifed with her current financial situation.

"We also check we already have, then we go to the grocery store and you have the app and you can synchronize your list to the app and the store which is super convenient because when you walk in the store, you don’t have to walk over there and back. You can do it super efficiently.” But, I would probably change the way of how inventory was communicated and managed. I think the warehouse process is elusive and it’s difficult to trace back that process and be transparent about what the price is. It’s also not in the interest of the supermarket to do so.”

Louisa – Participant 2, Female, 25-34 years old

"We also check we already have, then we go to the grocery store and you have the app and you can synchronize your list to the app and the store which is super convenient because when you walk in the store, you don’t have to walk over there and back. You can do it super efficiently.” But, I would probably change the way of how inventory was communicated and managed. I think the warehouse process is elusive and it’s difficult to trace back that process and be transparent about what the price is. It’s also not in the interest of the supermarket to do so.”

Ingrid– Participant 3, Female, 45-55 years old

Dutch citizen, holds a Bachelor's diploma, works as a Dutch language teacher, lives with her husband and two adult children, has an average household income between €50,000 and €100,000 and is very highly satisfied with her current financial situation.

"Every week it is different <laughs> I find it nice to make new things. Right now we have Marley Spoon and every time is something new and I really like making new things because we like cooking. We’ve used it now for about one or two months and I think the quality is nice. But, I think if I were to buy the groceries myself, it would be more affordable. But I find it to be relatively a lot of money. Like if I bought the same things at Lidl it would be more affordable.

Ingrid– Participant 3, Female, 45-55 years old

Chiara – Participant 4, Female, 35-44 years old

Italian citizen, holds a bachelor's diploma, currently works as a Logistics Planner, lives with her husband and one young child, prefers not to state household income, and is very highly satisfied with her current financial situation.

“In the past few years it’s much easier, we usually go for the quick recipes and we leave the complex recipes more for the weekend when we have more time to cook. But for me I think it’s like a 20 minute job once a week. I don’t have enough time because of work and kids and everything else... I know there are companies that do the delivery with the package. First of all, I think it’s a bit expensive and second of all, I need to give it a try. But it is a smart idea, recipes and groceries and it’s delivery and all you need to do is cook. It eliminates all the mental work."

Chiara – Participant 4, Female, 35-44 years old

INITIAL CONCEPT IDEATION

Personalized Meal-Planning App

Sketches were made by hand to generate potential solutions in the form of a product and/or service that solved the original research questions. The basis for the final design stemmed from a an app concept that creates customized dinner plans based on one's individual and/or household profile, cooking habits, and budget. Users (or multiple members of a household) would first answer a series of questions about themselves and household. These variables included, but were not limited to...

Number of people in the household
Cooking context and cooking skill level
Life profile, household and work dynamics
Desired time spent prepping / cooking dinner
Budget and financial preferences (e.g., price per meal)

The app / service would output recommended meals with a breakdown of ingredients, for each meal. The meals and corresponding ingredients would match the input preferences and household budget goals.

The key feature of this concept would be tradeoffs where users can swap money for having to spend less time prepping dinner. For example, the app could suggest “whole carrots” (5 min prep time, €1,25) or “chopped carrot pieces” (0 min prep time, €2,35). User then have the discretion to choose more / less expensive items, or more / less time spent cooking. The meal plan would be based around...

A person’s (or household’s) agenda
How often someone wishes to cook
Which days they cook on
How many minutes they'd like to spend cooking
Which days they typically do grocery shopping

Dinner is typically the most labor-intensive meal of the day.

It also comes at the end of the day, where people are usually tired and have limited time. The main goal was to focus on (1) the agenda; and (2) reducing cognitive labor having to plan and think about what to have for dinner. The system would yield recommended meals (dinner plans for the week) and list the meals alongside the most important variables – what days to cook, what days to eat, prep time, cook time, meal cost, and cost per serving, etc.)

INITIAL CONCEPT IDEATION

Personalized Meal-Planning App

Sketches were made by hand to generate potential solutions in the form of a product and/or service that solved the original research questions.

The basis for the final design stemmed from a an app concept that creates customized dinner plans based on one's individual and/or household profile, cooking habits, and budget.

Users (or multiple members of a household) would first answer a series of questions about themselves and household. These variables included, but were not limited to...

Number of people in the household
Cooking context and skill level
Life, household, and work dynamics
Desired prep time and cooking time
Budget and financial preferences

The app would output recommended meals with a breakdown of ingredients for each meal. The meals and corresponding ingredients would match the input preferences and household budget goals.

A person’s (or household’s) agenda
How often someone wishes to cook
Which days they cook on
How many minutes they'd like to spend cooking
Which days they typically do grocery shopping

Dinner is typically the most labor-intensive meal of the day.

USER JOURNEY FLOW DIAGRAM

The user flow below maps the onboarding journey, guiding users from account creation to a fully personlaized meal plan based on their preferences, dietary needs, health considerations, and underlying household factors. These steps then served as a basis for creating a paper prototype of the mobile screens. Key user flow elements include:

Onboarding & Profile Setup ➤ New users complete a guided onboarding process
Personalization Inputs ➤ Users define supermarket preferences, household size, cooking habits, and budget
Customization & Finalization ➤ Refine profile by selecting tools, routines, and schedules to align with meal plan
Final outcome ➤ A structured, flexible meal plan is generated, reducing cognitive load and optimizing prep efficiency

Tap to enlarge flow diagram into lightbox for detailed view of all elements

USER JOURNEY FLOW DIAGRAM

• Onboarding & Profile Setup ➤ New users complete a guided onboarding process

• Personalization Inputs ➤ Users define supermarket preferences, household size, cooking habits, and budge

• Customization & Finalization ➤ Refine profile by selecting tools, routines, and schedules to align with meal plan

• Final outcome ➤ A structured, flexible meal plan is generated, reducing cognitive load and optimizing prep efficiency

CREATING THE PAPER PROTOTYPE

The screens were designed using Sktech for the sake of efficiency instead of tediously drawing each screen by hand. The app relies heavilty on images, text, and categories for users to make decisions. I wanted to ensure that all buttons, icons, images, and elements were understandable and representative. All paper "screens" were printed out and glued to cardstock for ergonomic ease.

Overview: The app is designed to answer the nearly universal burdensome problem of "What are we going to eat this week?" The main goal is to help people save time and money by offloading the mental work surrounding the whole meal-planning process, ingredient aggregation, and prepping for supermarket shopping.

Tap images to enlarge paper prototype screens and elements in lightbox for detailed view

CREATING THE PAPER PROTOTYPE

TESTING STRATEGY AND METHODS

Key metrics for success

Qualitative insights – Gathered through the concurrent think-aloud method (CTA) ➤ Participants vocalize their thoughts as a sort of "play by play" working through the task(s). The goal of the CTA is to capture responses in "real time" to identify pain points, user expectations, attitudes, motivations, and opinions during interaction and task completion.

• Quantitative metrics – Effectiveness is determined by the (1) number of total errors per task) encountered by the participant and (2) Task Success is measured by whether or not the participant completed the task; and (3) Efficiency is determined by the amount of time participants spent on each task (in minutes).

Testing Method & Tools

PARTICIPANTS

Testing sessions were completed by the same people, who also took part in the preliminary qualitative interviews, aside from one participant who was unable to partake due to personal circumstances.

The rationale for this is...

• Continuity in mental models and understanding – Participants who already discuessed their needs, mental models, and pain points earlier have a better cognitive framework for evaluating the prototype ➤ They can contextualize the prototype within their previously expressed experiences, needs, and expectations of what the prototype should look like and function

• Reduction in variability and increased reliability – The goal is to maintain and ensure consistency. Introducing new participants betyween phases introduces confounding variables that can obscure true insights. By keeping participants the same, it better controls for differences (e.g., prior technological experience, cognitive biases, etc.)

• Pyschological commitment and engagement – Basically this means: More thoughtful insights. Users may value what they contribute to in the design and development of something the give feedback on over time. Expressing pain points early on and seeing if those pain points have been adrressed in the prototype design creates a sense of resolve.

GOALS & SUBTASKS

Main Goal: Participants were to complete the onboarding flow and create a complete profile successfully by interacting with the paper prototype of the app ➤ Subtasks: The goal was defined by effective completion of all the following tasks collectively [See 1-6].

Create a home profile
Set-up a meal profile
Sign-up with personal information
Set up a kitchen profile and smart agenda
Budget profile for finances and cooking time

TOOLS DURING TESTING

Paper prototype and all component paper “buttons” and fields; Tiny hair ties to keep all the paper pieces together
Gorillapod for holding phone during recordings
iPhone XS - for recording video and audio
Camera native iOS app on iPhone for recording video
Voice Memos native iOS app for recording post-testing audio
Script - For conducting and leading the test
Consent form - Authorization for audio and video recording
Demographic survey - For collecting participant data
€10 digital gift cards to Albert Heijn supermarket, as compensation

TOOLS AFTER TESTING

Macbook Air for reviewing recordings and reporting results
Quicktime on Macbook Air for reviewing and analyzing video recordings
Mac Numbers for calculating quantitative results
Google slides for compiling results

TESTING STRATEGY AND METHODS

Key metrics for success

Testing Method & Tools

PARTICIPANTS

Testing sessions were completed by the same people, who also took part in the preliminary qualitative interviews, aside from one participant who was unable to partake due to personal circumstances.

The rationale for this is...

GOALS & SUBTASKS

Create a home profile
Set-up a meal profile
Sign-up with personal information
Set up a kitchen profile and smart agenda
Budget profile for finances and cooking time

TOOLS DURING TESTING

Paper prototype and all component paper “buttons” and fields; Tiny hair ties to keep all the paper pieces together
Gorillapod for holding phone during recordings
iPhone XS - for recording video and audio
Camera native iOS app on iPhone for recording video
Voice Memos native iOS app for recording post-testing audio
Script - For conducting and leading the test
Consent form - Authorization for audio and video recording
Demographic survey - For collecting participant data
€10 digital gift cards to Albert Heijn supermarket, as compensation

TOOLS AFTER TESTING

Macbook Air for reviewing recordings and reporting results
Quicktime on Macbook Air for reviewing and analyzing video recordings
Mac Numbers for calculating quantitative results
Google slides for compiling results

Participant snapshots testing fork prototype

RESULTS AND REFLECTION FROM TESTING SESSIONS

Research Questions

RQ1: What difficulties and pain points were encountered in the testing sessions?

Many had to warm up interacting with the paper prototype as none had seen this before
They had to ease into figuring out how the protoype worked as a crude model
The overall experience was quite positive and there was a sense of joy in the novelty of the experience

RQ2: What were sources of errors and confusion amongst participants?

Some functionality (being paper) made the usability less intuitive
Functionality shoud have allowed for making profiles for multiple household members
The range of "preferences" should have been wider to include diverse diets and needs
Linguistically "dietary preferences" was confusing, not universally understood
The benefits of location access permissions were not clear or convincing

RQ3: What were the positive outcomes and takeaways from the testing sessions?

Participants were enthusiastic and receptive to the app concept and design
There was excitement towards something that could save them time and money finding recipes
All participants genuinely enjoyed the "hands-on" tangible (game-like) testing experience
The prototype was organized, clear, and made it easy to work through thge tasks

RESULTS AND REFLECTION FROM TESTING SESSIONS

Research Questions

RQ1: What difficulties and pain points were encountered in the testing sessions?

Many had to warm up interacting with the paper prototype as none had seen this before
They had to ease into figuring out how the protoype worked as a crude model
The overall experience was quite positive and there was a sense of joy in the novelty of the experience

RQ2: What were sources of errors and confusion amongst participants?

Some functionality (being paper) made the usability less intuitive
Functionality shoud have allowed for making profiles for multiple household members
The range of "preferences" should have been wider to include diverse diets and needs
Linguistically "dietary preferences" was confusing, not universally understood
The benefits of location access permissions were not clear or convincing

RQ3: What were the positive outcomes and takeaways from the testing sessions?

Participants were enthusiastic and receptive to the app concept and design
There was excitement towards something that could save them time and money finding recipes
All participants genuinely enjoyed the "hands-on" tangible (game-like) testing experience
The prototype was organized, clear, and made it easy to work through thge tasks

Paper prototypes serve as anchoring objects for retrospective probe: This method was highy effective for eliciting feedback from participants after the test was completed. The paper "screens" act as artifacts which users could easily reference back to in order to give further critique, advice, and opinions on about their expectations and overall experience. For instance, laying out all the cards in front of oneself and going through each – one by one – to give constructive, detailed feedback.

REFLECTIONS AND PROPOSED DESIGN CHANGES

Luckily, given the overall generally positive experience, there were no "major" glaring issues. Instead, there were aspects that deserved greater attention and needed modification in designing the high-fidelity prototype version:

1. Prioritize clear and accessible UX Writing ➤ People process information differently based on their individual literacy levels, linguistic background, and processing capacity (e.g., energy levels, fluency, etc.). Some of the design choices were revised to align with universal, real-world linguistic expectations and information arhcitecture. For example, there was some confusion as to how "allergies" should be presented as "restrictions" versus dietary "preferences" in customizing one's profile.

2. Streamline the onboarding process to only inlcude essential features ➤ The oboarding process too far too long (approx. 8 minutes) which was far too long for those wanting to jump-in and explore the app. The flow should have also included a progress bar to show how far along participants were in the process of creating a profile, better orient themselves, and increase a sense of user control.

3. Defer detailed profile personalization options ➤ Profile customization features such as "kitchen profile" and "smart agenda" should be presented later after the user has completed onboarding to allow for more efficient engagement. Minimizing the setup time reduces dropoff and abandonment by not overwhelming people with information and micro-task overload. People quickly want to see and determine the value, thus expediting the flow to see recipes as soon as possible increases engagemement.

REFLECTIONS AND PROPOSED DESIGN CHANGES

CREATING THE HIGH-FIDELITY PROTOTYPE

The low-fidelity mockups were translated into high-fidelity renders using Sketch and In-Vision. All vector illustrations are original and were drawn by hand using Affinity Designer on iPad. Four examples are shown below. The prototype included...

1. User onboarding – 4 screens depicting and describing the purpose and benefits of the Fork app. All UI visuals in terms of illustrated graphics were self-designed using a combination of the Affinity Designer app for iPad and Figma.

2. Sign-up and registration – 9 screens showing the pathways and progress for signing-up using email or Google. Google was chosen based on positive feedback from the paper prototype testing as an efficient means to sign-up.

3. Setup personal profile – 12 screens where users can input their recipe and food interests, dietary and health considerations, and financial budget goals per weekly grocery spending.

An overview of all screens is shown below. Tap for full, detailed lightbox view.

CREATING THE HIGH-FIDELITY PROTOTYPE

3. Setup personal profile – 12 screens where users can input their recipe and food interests, dietary and health considerations, and financial budget goals per weekly grocery spending.

CONCLUSIONS AND MAIN TAKEAWAYS

While the problem of exponentially rising grocery prices cannot simply be solved by a design solution itself, this project attempted to at least understand how to give people a greater sense of control over their household financial situation. In creating a solution that synthesizes individual preferences and larger holistic goals, it both supported a greater sense of autonomy and reduced the cognitive load associated with complex food choices and meal planning.

The key design feature that made this concept app so appealing and enjoyable for potential users was the emphasis on personalization and time-saving: efficiently finding and yielding relevant, budget-conscious options for users that meet their needs. Having to sort and scour across websites and other domains for "good" recipes was a shared collective experience of loathing amongst all participants. Saving time, especially for busy working households, was essentially a form of valuable intangible currency.

The high fidelity prototype has a lot of potential for expansion and improvement towards a final form app which, when implemented, could potentially be transformative in the way households navigate the shared challenge of "What are we going to eat this week?" in a way that does not break the bank.

Moving forward with the design: Since food and its enjoyment is such a sensory and personal experience, the design focus should concentrate on aesthetics and visuals, social proof and trustworthiness of reviews, and suggesting recipes that resonate with users' individual profiles and preferences. This would be embodied by high quality photos, opportunities for user feedback, and advanced personalization and filter features.

CONCLUSIONS AND MAIN TAKEAWAYS

In creating a solution that synthesizes individual preferences and larger holistic goals, it both supported a greater sense of autonomy and reduced the cognitive load associated with complex food choices and meal planning.

Having to sort and scour across websites and other domains for "good" recipes was a shared collective experience of loathing amongst all participants. Saving time, especially for busy working households, was essentially a form of valuable intangible currency.