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Archit Bhise, <archit@mit.edu>
Abby Klein, <kleinab@mit.edu>
Rishikesh Tirumala <rrt@mit.edu>
TA: Juho Kim, <juhokim@mit.edu>
Problem Statement
Motivation:
Ordering food at a restaurant is an arcane process, often leading to huge-lag times, inefficient decision making, and food-choice confusion. Customers of various age groups and demographics are confused over food choices, not sure what an item contains or looks like, and want to know more about what past customers have said about a particular dish. Waiters are frustrated that customers are not sure what to order and aren’t specific enough with their tastes. Finally, managers are left with a poorly-managed situation where both frustrated waiters, and indecisive customers clash, and business potentially declines.
Potential:
We want to create a mobile-enabled web application that makes it easy for customers to understand what exactly they are ordering, what a restaurant has to offer and what cuisine choices a restaurant is most suited toward. We want to remove the source of frustration for customers, waiters and managers alike. We want to construct the next-generation interactive menu to disrupt the archaic restaurant relic.
Customers have used paper menus when ordering from a restaurant for decades. While paper menus were perhaps the best choice before the technological boom, they often lack the information that customers desire to make a decision. For example, customers of various ages and demographics want to see pictures of entrees and know exactly what ingredients are in their food. Entrees sometimes have confusing names and paper menus often offer little explanation. Most seriously, the small font and arbitrary organization of paper menus makes them difficult to parse, particularly for customers with food allergies and other restraints.
We want to create the next-generation menu by updating the paper menu to a mobile app. We want menu exploration to be a more interactive process, with the customer being able to organize and filter it as he/she pleases. We want to provide the user with as much information as possible (food appearance, ingredients, and more) without feeling overwhelmed by pages and pages of small font. Going to restaurants is enjoyable and relaxing--why shouldn’t ordering food be?
GR1 - User and Task Analysis
GR2 - Designs
GR3 - Paper Prototypes
GR4 - Computer Prototyping
GR5 - Implementation
GR6 - User Testing
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