foodprint

Executive summary

FoodPrint is a digital platform designed to connect eateries with surplus food to potential customers online. The eateries upload their surplus food at half the price on the platform, where potential customers make purchases in their nearby eateries and come to collect. The eateries, therefore, make a profit on food that could have otherwise gone to waste, and the customers get the food, which is good for consumption at half the price, saving them their money. FoodPrint operates using the B2C business model in which it connects businesses that are the food makers to the potential customers. FoodPrint digital marketing strategy takes the responsible principle that entails adopting a balanced approach taking care of the needs of the eateries, customers, and society. FoodPrint stakeholders include FoodPrint employees, producers, and consumers. Both producers and consumers cooperate in value co-creation. Customers are active participants in a service dominant logic; they have to help the producers, who are the service creators understand their preferences by providing the appropriate feedback via the digital platform. FoodPrint design thinking is built on the three lenses: Desirability, feasibility, and viability. Digital customer journey refers to interactions between the users and a company’s brand. FoodPrint creates its brand awareness through various touchpoints; a website that introduces its brand to the target customers; eateries, and potential clients. Through the website, the users can download the FoodPrint app and follow the activities of the food distribution software through shared media platforms such as Facebook and Instagram. Evaluation of the Foodprint’s customer journey, various business ideas can be deduced to help improve from the current state that includes: Integrating a chatbox, Expanding the producers and market base, Outsourcing delivery drivers, Adopting email marketing, and improving on feedback. On prioritizing the business opportunities, improving the feedback is the recommended business opportunity since it is a link to discovering other business opportunities, eradicating any loopholes, and giving the customer an opportunity to participate be part of the platform design process.

Introduction

FoodPrint is an application designed to ensure environmental sustainability by reducing food wastage and sustainable diets for the consumers as well (Newshub, 2022). It is an innovation designed with human needs at the center while providing ease of doing business and protecting the environment. This paper evaluates Food Print’s business model, value co-creation processes with and among different stakeholders, digital customer journey, and prioritize and thinks through Foodprint's digital business opportunities using rapid prototyping.

FoodPrint business model

A business model gives the picture or a representation of how a company operates; the products sold, services provided, how it makes profits, caters for expenses and locates its target market (Ardolino et al., 2020). FoodPrint adopts a Business to Consumer business model (B2C) (Ardolino et al., 2020). FoodPrint connects eateries with surplus food that could waste consumers at a relatively discounted price. The use of digital technology helps restaurants, cafes, and food makers to have sustainable operations by assisting them in selling all the food that could have gone to waste (Foodprint, 2022). On the other hand, selling good food that could have gone to landfills helps reduce pollution and release carbon gas into the environment contributing to a safer planet. FoodPrint helps food retailers to make more profit while allowing customers to access affordable food. FoodPrint digital marketing strategy takes the responsible principle (Mandal, 2017). The foodPrint digital platform tries to adopt a balanced approach taking care of the needs of the eateries, customers, and society. The business problem at hand is that eateries end up wasting food, which is thrown away when the shelf life ends, the thrown food ends up in landfills polluting the environment. On the other hand, society has people going without food yet we have wasted food that was good. FoodPrint acts as an intermediary providing a platform for eateries with surplus food to connect with consumers and eradicate chaos (Foodprint, 2022).

Stakeholders mapping and value co-creation

The foodPrint digital platform is an interface connecting different stakeholders, mainly its employees, interested producers, and consumers. Producers involved are all the eateries with a surplus that is likely to go to waste. Consumers are the customers who purchase food from these eateries that include anyone who has the app; however, FoodPrint has its eyes in areas with a strong presence of students. The platform match makes these eateries with potential customers use a service dominant logic approach to marketing (Lessard, 2015); this is achieved through providing a digital solution on how customers purchase foodstuffs and helping them locate eateries near their locations, making the process very smooth (Ethically Kate, 2022). Customers get their value through experience, which they can share feedback by giving reviews on the FoodPrint app rating their experience. The goal is to connect customers to places where they can get food at discounted rates and provide them with room to give specifications and preferences and search for foodstuff that suits their taste. Both producers and consumers cooperate in value co-creation. Customers are active participants in a service dominant logic; they have to help the producers, who are the service creators understand their preferences by providing the appropriate feedback via the digital platform (Lessard, 2015). On the other hand, the eateries deliver the food to the consumers with its correct value preventing wastage and making more profits. The FoodPrint stakeholders work together to prevent food wastage, save money, and rescue the environment to ensure sustainable consumption (Love Food Hate Waste, 2022).

Digital customer journey

Design thinking entails coming up with world-changing innovations through balancing desirability that is the human needs at hand, feasibility referring to the technological capabilities, and viability, which is the societal needs (Mandal, 2017). FoodPrint design thinking is built three lenses; one, it embraces desirability in design thinking by addressing the human food problem bearing in mind that the world suffers from food insecurity (Nzherald.co.NZ, 2022); unfortunately, it is noted that a third of the world’s food produced for human consumption ends up in landfills. Therefore, reducing food wastage saves our planet from carbon emissions coming from uneaten food. The platform gives eateries an opportunity to make profits on food that could have gone to waste while providing clients a chance to enjoy meals at subsidized prices (Ethically, Kate, 2022). Two, feasibility; the digital marketing technology is very suitable in that it connects eateries to potential customers; it continually creates a database of customers and helps them locate nearby eateries from their places of residence; the customers can explore the various food categories, make orders and then go to collect making the technology very useful. Lastly, the viability design thinking lenses take care of the environment; the surplus food that was to go to landfills is saved, keeping the planet from greenhouses gases that come from animal dietaries (Newshub, 2022).

Digital customer journey refers to interactions between the users and a company’s brand (Moon et al., 2016). FoodPrint has a well-articulated customer journey from awareness creation to service acquisition. FoodPrint creates its brand awareness through various touchpoints. First, the company has a website that introduces its brand to the target customers: eateries and potential clients. Through the website, the users can download the FoodPrint app and follow the activities of the food distribution software through shared media platforms such as Facebook and Instagram (Foodprint, 2022). Additionally, the website has a contact page, which provides an email and engages the FoodPrint employees. The website markets the FoodPrint brand quite well; those wishing to be partners can get in touch and add their eateries. The eaterie's pain point is that they have surplus food that goes to waste. Henceforth joining FoodPrint will help them make a profit on food that would have gone to waste, and they will also play an important role by reducing the environmental pollution. On the other hand, consumers are target customers who will buy food from the eateries, and their pain point is food affordability. FoodPrint allows consumers to get food that they could buy at prices out of range in restaurants at half the price (Love Food Hate Waste, 2022).

The foodPrint customer journey begins with the awareness that eateries offer good food at excellent prices, and such foods can be ordered by downloading the mobile app. A client can search and discover various eateries from the mobile app and identify those close to their location(Foodprint, 2022). The client then orders food from their preferred eatery, makes the payment, and presents the receipt to the eatery to collect the food. Additionally, the client can specify their favorite food for specialized experiences, such as getting notifications when their favorite food is on the shelf. Further, the client can leave reviews to give their expertise on the platform for future improvement. FoodPrint connects these customers to food that could go to waste, such as a canceled order or food leftover after a shift ends.

Analyzing the FoodPrint digital customer journey, the following business opportunities are evident. First, real-time communication is missing from the platform, such as a chatbox where producers and consumers can familiarize themselves faster. A chat box will provide a real-time feel and customer support, improving the performance. Secondly, the customer base can be improved by targeting a larger group of producers and consumers to create a large pool of eateries. FoodPrint should focus on the individual consumers and group consumers, such as employees of certain companies. Third, Food distribution is another business opportunity that can be explored though it should apply for group customers willing to bear the costs where possible. Since providing home delivery for FoodPrint could be challenging, it is advisable to try also to connect with delivery drivers to provide delivery services to customers; this will remove the distance barrier. Sometimes customers could place orders but lack time to collect them due to their tight schedules; hence delivery services are necessary. Moreover, using delivery services could assist eateries to access a bigger customer base, including those that are far. Fourth, email marketing is another business opportunity for FoodPrint; it entails creating an email list for all the subscribed customers and creating automated emails sent once or twice a week. Lastly, improving feedback helps identify gaps in the customer journey and discover other customer needs that could be incorporated. Feedback can be done through surveys, which are reported back to the customer care desk, helping do away with all the loopholes.

Prioritizing Business Opportunities

Business Opportunity	Potential	Importance	Ease	Score
Integrating a chatbox	7	9	8	8
Expanding the producers and market base	9	10	8	9
Outsourcing delivery drivers	8	8	7	7.7
Adopting email marketing	8	9	9	8.6
Improving on feedback	9	10	9	9.3

Prioritizing the business opportunities looks at their potential, importance, and ease of implementation. Improving on feedback is the highest scoring business opportunity (9.3). The business opportunity has great potential to improve the operations of the FoodPrint platform by helping discover the customer experiences and get their insights; This can help eradicate any loopholes and even adopt better suggestions. Therefore, it is a business opportunity that helps understand the customers' needs and provides a way of enhancing the current state. On the importance, feedback is key because it helps measure if the platform's goals are met. Lastly, it is very easy to implement a feedback system like customer surveys to help improve their service experience. Applying the rapid prototyping, the digital customer journey will change by including a robust feedback system besides the existing rating one experience. The feedback system gives the customers an opportunity to participate in the design-making process and eradicate any assumptions.

The above prototype is then tested to see if it meets its expectations and is adopted.

Conclusion

FoodPrint is an excellent application providing a digital platform to satisfy human needs and protect the environment. The app design is human centered with a major goal of providing food to customers with small budgets at half the usual price and giving eateries with surplus food, which would go to waste an opportunity to sell it at half the price. The strategy makes food affordable because eateries make more profits, generally lowering the charges on the food. The cooperation between eateries and potential customers creates value to the society in reducing food wastage, which in turn results greenhouse gas emissions. Improving customers’ feedback will help FoodPrint to have a sustainable pathway in the market while promoting sustainable consumption and the planet.

REFERENCES

Lessard, L. (2015). Modeling Value Cocreation Processes and Outcomes in Knowledge-Intensive Business Services Engagements. Service Science, 7(3), 181-195. doi: 10.1287/serv.2015.0104

Foodprint: The App That Reduces Food Waste & Saves You Money — Ethically Kate. (2022). Retrieved 6 February 2022, from https://ethicallykate.com/blog/2020/8/5/foodprint-the-app-that-reduces-food-waste-saves-you-money

Download the Foodprint app and stop delicious food being thrown away | Love Food Hate Waste. (2022). Retrieved 6 February 2022, from https://lovefoodhatewaste.co.nz/foodprint-app/

Ardolino, M., Saccani, N., Adrodegari, F., & Perona, M. (2020). A Business Model Framework to Characterize Digital Multisided Platforms. Journal Of Open Innovation: Technology, Market, And Complexity, 6(1), 10. doi: 10.3390/joitmc6010010

Moon, H., Han, S., Chun, J., & Hong, S. (2016). A Design Process for a Customer Journey Map: A Case Study on Mobile Services. Human Factors And Ergonomics In Manufacturing & Service Industries, 26(4), 501-514. doi: 10.1002/hfm.20673

Foodprint. (2022). Retrieved 6 February 2022, from https://foodprint.app/

Newshub. (2022). Retrieved 6 February 2022, from https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/lifestyle/2019/06/foodprint-the-game-changing-new-app-ready-to-tackle-our-food-waste-problem.html

Nzherald.co.nz (2022). Retrieved 6 February 2022, from https://www.nzherald.co.nz/brand-insight/the-food-problem-nz-should-not-have/STBEWGPQCREG5LRGSTTJ7NISLI/

Mandal, P. (2017). Understanding Digital Marketing Strategy. International Journal Of Scientific Research And Management. doi: 10.18535/ijsrm/v5i6.11

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