Understanding the Problem

The food system contributes to 26% of global greenhouse gas emissions, and food choices are a significant part of an individual’s carbon footprint. On campus, where 50,000 students navigate hectic schedules, environmental concerns often take a back seat to taste, price, and convenience.

The findings underscored the need for a more intuitive, accessible solution to encourage low-carbon food choices, tailored to the behaviors and values of college students.

Understanding Student Behavior

To tackle this challenge, we immersed ourselves in understanding student behaviors through a combination of field studies and surveys.

Observations were conducted in three types of stores near campus: small markets, large grocery stores, and sustainable food stores.

Students prioritize convenience, flavor, and price over environmental concerns. Visual labels and in-store signage are crucial but must be eye-catching to attract attention.

The survey aimed to deepen insights into UW students’ grocery shopping habits, preferences, and attitudes towards sustainability. It was designed based on findings from the field study and distributed via Discord, WeChat, and QR codes around campus.

We observed that students need interventions that are easy but effective due to their busy schedules. Sustainability messaging should be in line with their current priorities, such as taste and affordability.

Early-stage Insights

Convenience Wins: Students prioritize time-saving, pre-made meals over raw ingredients.

Knowledge Gaps: Most students don’t understand carbon labels, and sustainability rarely influences purchase decisions

Technology Habits: Students rely heavily on smartphones, making a mobile app an ideal intervention platform.

Next:
Refining the Design Question

Based on these insights, we refined our design question to:
“How might we enhance college students’ food purchase planning experience to encourage low-carbon options?”This shift allowed us to focus on pre-purchase planning, where students have the time and tools to make informed decisions.

What It Does

Rewards sustainable choices through a user-friendly app that helps improve diet health and affordability.

Record calories and carbon FoodPrint in one place.

Trigger to open: Provide utility feature like Cal-culator to encourage users to open the app.

How Research Guided Design

Surveys revealed flavor and price as priorities, ensuring the app balanced these with sustainability goals.

Observations showed students’ preference for recommendations, leading to dynamic suggestion features.

Usability testing highlighted the need for intuitive navigation, leading to refined UI elements and simplified workflows.

Defining the Requirements

• Target Audience: Limited to college students.
• Scope: Focuses solely on reducing the carbon footprint through food purchasing decisions.
• Verification: Advocates only for food options where carbon impact can be reliably verified.
• Net Impact: Ensures the solution itself generates less carbon than it helps save.

• Some college students are open to adjusting their food planning habits.
• Many students care about their carbon footprint but lack the tools or knowledge to act on it.
• Promoting verified low-carbon food choices will result in measurable reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.

Ideation

Brainstorming sessions focused on balancing user priorities with sustainability goals.

Meet Linda, a busy college student juggling academic pressure and daily responsibilities. On a typical Friday, she decided to cook a dish inspired by a TikTok recipe. Excited to recreate it, she realized she lacked some essential ingredients, including green onions. Frustrated but resourceful, she pivoted to cooking with what she had, adding green onions to a growing memo of items she needed to buy.

With multiple grocery stores near her apartment, Linda faced a common challenge:

- Which store has all the ingredients she needs?
- How can she stick to her $50 weekly budget?
- Can she prioritize freshness and convenience without compromising on sustainability?

Linda wanted to make eco-conscious choices but didn’t have the bandwidth to research the carbon footprint of her groceries after an intense week of study.

Linda’s situation highlights a critical user need: a tool that simplifies decision-making, balancing practical priorities like cost and convenience with environmental considerations. Imagine a solution that could:

- Aggregate store inventories and recommend the best options for her shopping list.
- Highlight low-carbon alternatives while respecting her budget and preferences.
- Save her time and effort, offering a seamless shopping experience.

This scenario became a cornerstone for the design of FoodPrint, as it encapsulated the challenges and opportunities in guiding busy students toward sustainable choices without adding complexity to their lives.

Prototype 1

Created medium-fidelity prototypes in Figma, iterating based on user feedback.

Usability Testing

Conducted tests with UW students, uncovering opportunities to simplify navigation and improve label clarity.

The usability evaluation for FoodPrint tested the app’s ability to guide students toward low-carbon food choices through a series of tasks. The primary goal was to assess whether the design effectively balanced user priorities like convenience, cost, and sustainability.

Behavioral Insights

- Participants prioritized price, convenience, and flavor over carbon data.
- Users preferred engaging with recommended items rather than searching manually.

Labelling Challenges

- Participants prioritized price, convenience, and flavor over carbon data.
- Users preferred engaging with recommended items rather than searching manually.

Usability Issues

- Some navigation paths and checkout flows required simplification.
- Participants appreciated the app’s grocery list feature but found certain UI elements unintuitive.

What We Learned

A focus on human-centered design ensured the app met students where they were—busy, budget-conscious, and tech-savvy.

By using research to continually refine our approach, we developed a solution aligned with both user behaviors and environmental goals.

Impact

Transformed the abstract challenge of carbon reduction into actionable, student-friendly steps.

Positioned sustainability as a natural extension of daily habits.

Conclusion

FoodPrint showcases the power of research-driven design to address complex challenges. By meeting students where they are—busy, budget-conscious, and tech-savvy—we turned sustainability from an abstract concept into an actionable part of everyday life.