Gro App

What it does

Gro is a smart grocery app that rewards users for sticking to their shopping list. By cross-checking receipts with planned items, it encourages and incentivizes mindful shopping, reduces food waste, and promotes sustainable habits for people and the planet.

Your inspiration

Gro was inspired by the question, "How can we reduce food waste by making grocery planning easy and rewarding?" I focused on consumer-level waste, where 31% of food loss occurs. Personally, I struggled with this, often shopping without a plan and throwing away unused food. This personal frustration and guilt, combined with insights from research, revealed that food waste starts at the planning stage. With 95% of discarded food ending up in landfills, emitting methane and worsening climate change, I saw an opportunity to design a solution that empowers users to shop mindfully and sustainably from the start. To shop smarter and waste less.

How it works

Gro is a smart grocery app that helps users reduce food waste by rewarding them for sticking to their grocery list. Users create a list in the app before shopping (as you would on pen and paper or through the notes app), then scan their receipt afterward. Gro cross-checks the receipt with the planned list and awards points that can be redeemed as coupons or deals based on how closely they followed it. This encourages mindful shopping and reduces overbuying. A built-in social feed adds accountability and community where users can share grocery hauls, milestones, and rewards, and follow others for inspiration. The app makes grocery planning more efficient, affordable, and fun, while tackling food waste at its source: the planning and shopping stage.

Design process

To tackle food waste, I began with secondary research, surveys, and interviews to identify key pain points in the shopping process. Findings showed that lack of planning and impulse buying lead to overbuying, and that people resist change if it’s inconvenient or costly. I focused on consumer-level waste, where 31% of food loss occurs, and designed Gro to make planning easy and rewarding. Next, I created user personas to define goals and behaviors, which informed a competitive analysis of apps like iOS Notes, Mealime, Instacart, Fetch, and pen & paper. I evaluated usability, flow, design, social features, and incentives. Fetch’s rewards system was the main source of inspiration, and I identified a gap in social accountability and gamified grocery planning. I storyboarded real-life scenarios, then sketched and wireframed three core features: Grocery List, Points & Rewards, and Social Feed. A low-fidelity prototype in Figma led to user testing and refinements. Then I developed a style guide and moodboard, then built a high-fidelity prototype. 70% of users said they’d use Gro. Feedback led to an addition of onboarding screens and better quantity controls in the grocery list feature. The process was iterative, empathetic, and insight-driven.

How it is different

Gro (a play on “grow” and “grocery”) stands out because it’s the only grocery list app that rewards users for sticking to their plan. While most apps focus on list-making or delivery, Gro introduces incentives and social accountability which are two features missing in the market. A competitive analysis of iOS Notes, Mealime, Instacart, Fetch, and pen & paper revealed this gap. Gro answers: “Why plan if it’s easier to impulse buy?” and “Who keeps me accountable?” With Gro, users earn points for following their grocery list, redeemable for deals and coupons. A built-in social feed lets users share grocery runs, milestones, and achievements which in turn makes grocery shopping and sticking to grocery lists community-driven and fosters socially accountability. It’s like having a grocery buddy that cheers you on while helping reduce food waste.

Future plans

The next step is to fully develop Gro and launch it in app stores to empower shoppers to reduce food waste through smart planning and rewards. With food waste being the largest category in U.S. landfills and a major source of methane, Gro can drive real climate impact. Gro can also make sustainability social. Users can share grocery hauls, milestones, and tips, building a community around mindful shopping. Winning the James Dyson Award would provide the funding, exposure, and confidence needed to turn this vision into a reality and bringing Gro from concept to a tool that helps people shop smarter and waste less.

Awards

Awarded "Most Innovative Final Project" in the DSGN 100 course at University of California, San Diego