6 AM Health
A Boston-born, Boston-built startup that makes fresh, nutritious food convenient, affordable, and accessible.
Goal: Create a product that offers convenient food options for a healthier lifestyle.
Timeline: 10 weeks between January — March 2020
My Role: UI/UX Designer
Team: Myself and another designer, three developers, and one project manager, all of us full-time Dartmouth College students and members of DALI Lab
Targeting the segment of consumers living busy lives, 6 AM Health aims to transform food consumption by making nutritious food convenient and accessible to all.
Why do we need to eat healthy?
Having a well-balanced diet provides your body with the essential nutrients it needs to function on a daily basis. Eating healthy food results in employees becoming happier, healthier, and more productive. While most of us know we need to lead healthier lives, often we don’t have time to make healthier choices.
What is the 6 AM Health Byte Fridge?
The Byte Fridge is basically a vending machine that provides a specially curated selection of salads, snacks, sandwiches, and cold-pressed juices.
With the Byte Fridges, there are two options:
- Public Fridges: Located in public spaces around Boston and are able to be viewed by all app users. Pre-Ordering is not allowed.
- Corporate Fridges: Located in offices and allows users to pre-order meals through app. In order to view these fridges on the app, the user must sign up with and verify their corporate email.
Giving Users the Autonomy to Pre-Order and Schedule their Meals
When designing the app, our goal was to make the ordering process as seamless as possible.
- Customers may use the in-app menu to view items’ nutrition label and add them to their online shopping carts.
- Once an order is placed, one will receive an order confirmation email with a receipt and an estimated delivery date for when they may pick up their order from the ByteFridge at their workplace.
Making the User Flow as Intuitive as Possible
Two points of frequent discussion within our team were:
- How should we handle the corporate email verification process?
- How do we create a distinction between the public and corporate Byte Fridges?
When the user first logs-in to the app, they can sign in with a personal or corporate email.
- If the user signs up with a personal email, they do not have to complete any further verification and instead are shown the screen “6 AM loves employees!”
- They are provided the option of verifying their corporate email on the My Account page and entering in the code sent to their email.
- This was designed mainly to target the user group that might spot a public fridge at a place like South Station, decide to create a 6AM Health account, and later realize that they have the option to get access to the fridges in their workplace.
If the user signs up with a corporate email, they will then be sent a verification link, which they will need to click in order to gain access to their company fridges. They will receive a confirmation once that has been completed.
- This was designed primarily for users who are already aware that their company is a 6 AM Partner and have downloaded the app with the purpose of being able to place an order for their company’s fridge(s).
Creating a Visual Distinction between Public and Corporate Fridges
Initially, there was quite a bit of confusion between the public and corporate Byte Fridges in terms of identifying them and differentiating their functionalities. One challenge we faced was creating a visual distinction between the two fridges on the map view page.
After user testing with multiple screens, we eventually decided to:
- List all the corporate fridges that a user has access to at the top (sorted by distance) followed by public fridges (sorted by distance)
- Add the company’s logo next to the title of the corporate fridge
- Add a grey divider to physically separate the corporate and public fridge listings
Reflections
- Great Design Work Doesn’t Happen Overnight: While it’s a good idea to set goals and expectations before starting a project, it is important to recognize that generating brilliant ideas and working through the design process takes time. Be patient with yourself and show appreciation for others’ ideas.
- Be Flexible and Adapt: Over the course of 10 weeks, there were several instances when our partners switched course and asked us to scrap things we had been working on in previous weeks. Although I was upset at first about the effort that I had put in, I realized that iteration is part of any major project.
- Don’t be Afraid to Ask for Help: As a new designer in the lab, it did feel a bit intimidating to be working alongside designers (and developers) who had been working in DALI Lab for multiple terms. However, I quickly realized that everyone was very willing to help when I needed it — my team, our mentor who had worked on this project previously, and really just anyone in the lab.
- It’s All About the Team: I never thought I would enjoy working with my team as much as I did. Everyone on our team was incredibly passionate about their work! Since we all came in with different strengths and weaknesses, it was important we communicated clearly and defined each of our responsibilities accordingly. Overall, I am really thankful for the welcoming environment that DALI Lab is and for the opportunity to work with a wonderful group of people!
What’s Next?
This was our 4th and last term on this project, and I couldn’t be more excited to announce that we will be launching our app on the App Store in two weeks! As the company continues to grow, there will be more Byte Fridges in the Boston area, and I can’t wait to pick up the delicious Southwest Bowl the next time I’m in the city.
Special Thanks
Project Manager: Sonal Butala
Co-Designer: Eric Wang
Developers: Thomas Monfre, Anne Bailey, and Sanjana Goli
Founder of 6AM Health and DALI Lab Partner: Brad Callow
