Forager App
Forager is a social app geared towards connecting recreational foragers with each other for the purposes of sharing knowledge and promoting sustainable practices. The app offers ways for people to connect with each other based on location or shared interest, as well as read up on the latest foraging topics and even keep field notes while out foraging.
Forager
Case Study 2024
My Role- Lead UI/UX Designer & UX Researcher, with advice from my mentor Carl Miller
Forager is a social app geared towards connecting recreational foragers with each other for the purposes of sharing knowledge and promoting sustainable practices. The app offers ways for people to connect with each other based on location or shared interest, as well as read up on the latest foraging topics and even keep field notes while out foraging.
The Challenge
Foraging is a fun way for sustainably-minded individuals to eat and be inspired by native plant species. However, many would-be foragers struggle to bridge the gap between reading about and consuming foraging-based content, and actually getting out there to forage for themselves.
Background
My initial interest in foraging came from my time working at a sustainability-focused restaurant in Austin, Texas called Emmer & Rye. We had a full-time, salaried forager on staff who went out into the Texas hill country and came back with ingredients. These foraged ingredients became the base and the inspiration for almost every dish on the menu, and changed the way I think about food, land, and seasonality.
research
Objectives
Identify foragers and potential foragers
Pinpoint pain points associated with the foraging process/community
Find solutions to increase earth-friendly foraging
Methodology
I began my research journey with a screener survey to target my potential user base. My goal was to target three types of potential users: potential foragers who faced some obstacle to actually getting out there to forage, occasional foragers with some baseline knowledge and experience, and experienced/professional foragers with insights on sustainable practices.
Once a group of potential users was established via a screener survey, I conducted user interviews to better understand users’ needs and pain points in regards to foraging and the greater foraging community. I organized some of the data from these interviews into an affinity map in order to group common themes.
affinity mapping
““One of the biggest things that hold people back is [the thought that] you’re consuming this stuff. What if it’s not actually safe?””
““If we had an ability to connect with other people who are also foraging, we could share knowledge… within our community””
