Our intervention aims to address the widespread challenge of forgotten ingredients, food waste, and meal-planning frustration. Many users struggle to keep track of their kitchen inventory, leading to expired items and hesitation to try new recipes. Our goal was to create a solution that simplifies ingredient management and inspires users to explore cooking in a sustainable, delightful way.
Introducing FreshStash, a system that empowers users to manage their kitchen inventory, reduce food waste, and streamline meal planning. Our solution involves a digital app and a receipt scanning device. The app combines ingredient tracking with contextual recipe suggestions, helping users maximize the potential of their current food stock. The receipt scanner, conveniently attaches to a refrigerator, and allows for input and tracking of the current ingredient inventory. By addressing the common pain points of ingredient forgetfulness, waste, and meal-planning complexity, FreshStash transforms everyday cooking into a seamless and sustainable experience.
In our process we conducted a survey to screen for research participants, observed our participants both at a grocery store location and at their home, and we interviewed our target audience to better understand their decision making process in regard to ingredient preservation and storage.
People purchase ingredients they are used to. Certain individuals care about the brand of ingredient while others are more interested in appearance. People who live with roommates must share a fridge and lack an organized storage system. Our study group tends to store ingredients by the need of refrigeration and category of item.
Individuals often forget ingredients because of the way they store them, rarely keeping a physical record of expiration dates, and relying on memory of past experiences for perishable ingredients.
Through interviews, contextual inquiries, and shadow observation sessions, we uncovered key pain points in the existing food management systems at the home.
People will seldom try new recipes for worry of a lack of necessary ingredients or difficulty in learning new recipes
Time and dietary restrictions are important to people when preparing meals and purchasing ingredients
There is a distinct difference in organization of ingredients between single occupancy and shared dwellings
How might we help people track ingredients
and offer culinary guidance without adding a burden?
In our ideation process we conducted multiple rounds of iterative testing and speed-dating sessions. After presenting our concepts to key stakeholders we synthesized our intervention as a standalone device for scanning expiration dates for grocery items brought home, and an app for tracking the current stockpile of foodstuffs and suggesting contextual recipes.
With features like automated inventory updates through receipt scanning, shared ingredient access for roommates, and a hands-free voice assistant for step-by-step instructions, FreshStash minimizes user effort while promoting culinary exploration and sustainability.
Our speculative standalone device scans expiration dates for grocery items brought home, and provides a hands-free contextual voice assistant for at-home cooking.
Our device includes a magnet array for refridgirator attachment, speaker, microphone, and reciept scanner.
FreshStash provides an insightful look into designing for daily routines and food management. By integrating user feedback, we created a practical tool that encourages sustainable meal practices and minimizes food waste.
I want to express my gratitude to our professors, Raelynn O'Leary and Ashley Deal, and my teammate Sam Ho for their invaluable guidance, support, and collaboration throughout this process.
