Make Coffee Cups Personal Again
Can we keep the personal touch it used to have? Concept design for a tech-enabled coffee chain
At the end of February, before pandemic hits Jakarta — when we all thought that everything was just fine — a coffee chain contacted me. They’re the newly anticipated brand in the rise of tech-enabled coffee chains in Indonesia following the success of China’s Luckin Coffee. They told me they were going to build an app and looking for a freelance UI/UX designer to help them.
I met with the head of engineering and their founder the next day (yes, they said they’re in a hurry). We talked about things like my design process, their business, and the market. I’ve been reading tech startups news for a decade and their business group is one of the most interesting to follow. At the end of the meeting, they asked me to throw a few ideas that will differentiate them from the others. They told me to send it with a quotation the day after (they really were in a hurry, I guess).
Long story short, we didn’t have a deal. Their app was still not available yet when this was published and I don’t know why. But one of the ideas that I came up with back then still sticks in my head because I really love it. It’s what I think has been missing from current tech-enabled coffee chains’ ordering process and how I try to bring it back.
Background
If you’re not familiar with ordering a drink from a tech-enabled coffee chain, let me walk you through. These beverage startups enable you to make an online delivery or grab-and-go order from their own app. The latter is really convenient for people who is too busy or avoiding queue. Customers can select a nearby store from the app, place their order, choose ‘self pick-up’, and pay using preferred method. The app will tell you when your drink is ready, then you can come to the store, get your QR scanned, and pick up your drink. Really that easy.
When an online order is placed, system at the store automatically prints a label to indicate the order number and customization of the drink. Here is a photo that I could find on the internet about the label (credits to the owner).
Using printed label isn’t something new, it’s already common even before these startups arrived. However, their biggest coffee chain competitor, Starbucks prefers not to. Of course Starbucks can do it with all of their resources (they actually do on small number of stores), but why do they keep writing their paper cup using marker?
Starbucks gained popularity on social media when people started sharing their coffee cup photo. Besides from the brand, people willingly share their photo either because it’s funny that their name spelled wrong or because of the message written in marker. Handwriting on the cup gives a value of personal touch which tech-enabled coffee chains lack of in the current process. In fact, to connect with people on a personal level is part of Starbucks’ customer experience and actually what is able to differentiate them from the others.
Tech Enables More Possibilities
As it was intended to, the grab-and-go feature has been saving a lot of customers’ time that was previously wasted on queue. And just like any other apps, when people keep using it from time to time they will start to fully understand the whole process and get creative on using it for their own purpose. Later the exact same feature will enable other things that might not be intended from the start. It will be the company’s turn to spot such behavior and enhance it to add more value to their app.
One day last year, a colleague went back to the office with a cup of coffee after lunch. It’s not usual for him to do so, the whole team usually grab-and-go from the same coffee chain in the evening. Later he told us that his girlfriend just sent it to him. From miles away, she ordered a drink at a store near our office using ‘self pick-up’, then sent the screenshot of the QR to my colleague so he can pick it up.
They used the same grab-and-go feature to send coffee to each other because they knew it enables them to do so. It was a possibility that I found really interesting and somehow supported by the business model. These startups rapidly open new stores as their strategy so people can get their fresh coffee almost everywhere in the city within walking distance.
Buying someone a coffee is a common thing to do — there are even some services that use the term — as an act of kindness and support.
If the current system lets people do that, what can we achieve if we develop the idea further? How could technology help enhance this activity?
Reference
In 2017, Square(now Cash App) launched their customizable cash card. The company lets you customize your own card when you’re requesting it from the app. You can draw anything on the given space and later it will be laser etched on a card and delivered to you. This simple feature let every card to be unique while keep maintaining the brand’s black card design.
As expected, everyone was sharing their own cash card photo. This trend gave Square some free social media advertising on their newly launched product. It wasn’t usual for people to share photos of a debit card before because what they had was just like everyone else’s. It has never been this personal.
Send Coffee as Something Personal from Anywhere
Rather than only making it possible to send coffee from the app, why not we enrich it with more personal touch? It’s what current tech-enabled coffee chains’ lack of, so how about we bring coffee cup’s handwriting message back using the same method Square did on cash card.
On customers’ app, there will be ‘Send It’ as the third option at the final step of placing an order. Customer can select someone from their friend list and draw a message on the given space. After the order is placed, a push notification will be sent to their friend or customer can copy the URL and send it using a messaging app. Their friend will open it and be able to see the order status, direction to the store, and QR code to pick-up the drink.
There will be no changes at the store working procedure. The coffee chain’s tech team only need to spare some space on the label to be able to print the order detail with the ‘attached image’.
Prototype & Screens
What’s Next?
This feature is expected to boost the brand’s social media presence and lead to more sales because it encourages customer to also buy for anyone other than themselves.
I think this ‘Send It’ feature would be a great start to make the app ‘more social’ in the future. Because there are still so much to explore from this.
