Macro Meal Planning

An app that connects beginner meal planners with experienced meal planners to help college students eat healthy on a budget.

OverviewResearchProcessPrototypesSummary

Project Overview

Challenges
Meal planning is something that falls to the wayside for college students and many young adults, however it is a necessary chore for those that want to
eat healthy on a budget. The burden of adding this chore to an already full schedule is daunting, and many opt for faster less healthy meals like fast food.
Objective
My objective while creating Macro was to bridge the gap between saving money by meal planning and saving time, by making meal planning a quick and easy process.  
Skills Used
Figma, UX/UI Design, Research
My Role
Product Design | User Interface Design | Content Design
Project timeline
4 weeks

Research and User Experience

Research Finding: College Students
College students spend a combined 11 billion dollars on fast food. This leads to problems because fast food is shown to increase the
risk of metabolic syndrome, a cluster of conditions that leads to serious heart diseases. This is the first problem that needed to be solved in this project.
Research Finding: Eating Healthy
46% percent of Americans list money as the largest barrier for eating nutritious food. However, the price isn’t as bad as it is often thought to be. A Harvard study found that it costs an average of 1.5 dollars more per day for a person to eat healthy, it just takes extra times and planning, which college students don't have. This is the second problem that needed to be solved in this project.
User Personas and App Concept
The app solves these problems by connecting experienced meal planners who want to make money with inexperienced meal planners who pay a subscription to access thousands of meal planning resources created by those who sign up as a mentor. This allows college students to eat healthy on a budget without spending time they don't have to keep itheir diets affordable.
Two user personas were created to inform the design of the user interface, the content and organization of the app,
and the overall user experience design. One to represent the mentors of the app, and one to represent the students
of the app.

Project Process

Userflow
The userflow was created to ensure a smooth navigation through
the app, mapping out how the user will be able to navigate the app.
Wireframes
The visual design of the project started with wireframes to assess how the application flows before becoming committed to specific details.
Userflow
The userflow is focused on the point of view of the students of the app, allowing users to travel from the home page, to their plans, the search function, grocery lists, and camera scan which allows users to take a photo of their groceries so the integrated AI can add multiple groceries at once.
Wireframes
The way the application works is by connecting experienced meal planners who want to make money with inexperienced meal planners who pay a subscription to access thousands of meal planning resources created by those who sign up as a mentor.

Design and Prototypes

Mobile Application Design
The app includes features such as an advanced search function to easily find content, a grocery list automatically created from your panned meals, easy access to meal planning mentors, and categorization of the food you have on hand to give recommendations on meals you have ingredients for.
Desktop and Tablet
I created a desktop and tablet view to go with the mobile app design. This would be especially helpful for the mentors who are creating content, to help them edit recipes and meal plans on a larger screen.
Prototypes
Throughout the process of designing the app, I kept how the prototype was going to work at the forefront of my mind, ensuring a smooth process for the user to go through when using the features of the app.

In Summary

Set of three mockups of Macro app
The Core of Macro
Macro helps college students eat healthy without breaking their budget or spending countless hours on saving money by connecting them to mentors who know how to meal plan.
Goals Completed
Throughout the process of creating this application I was able to learn valuable lessons on user interface design, accessibility standards, and the process for creating a product from the market research to the finishing touches in the interface.
Copyright © 2024 AnnaGrace Call