Smart Grocery Cart

The goal of this project was to design a new grocery cart system that allows users to bypass the checkout line. The proposed system is a culmination of research and design that aims to achieve this goal.

Final Paper

The current prototype allowed users to complete their assigned tasks while we simulated the grocery shopping experience. Using the Verbal Protocol Analysis, System Usability Scale and Cognitive Walkthrough methods we analysed and evaluated our design, and were able to identify elements that we needed to change to ensure that a variety of users are able to use the product.

However, while we were able to understand the user perceptions and usability through our analyses, there were some limitations in our methods that might have impacted our findings. Some of the limitations of our test were that we had a small sample size testing our prototype, and they were all in the age range of 23-27 years. This limits our understanding of how older adults may interact with the system. To understand whether this product can be implemented on a large scale, it would be integral to test the system with a more diverse sample, especially in terms of age and technological use and knowledge. As we had limited resources, all of our participants were from the Methods in HCI course, which meant that they all had more experience in using and evaluating designs as compared to the rest of the population.

Another limitation was that as our prototype was rescritive; we were unable to understand the natural user behaviors as they interact with the system. Instead, they followed a fixed set of instructions that were provided to them with very specific directions. In reality, this would not happen and in order to get a better understanding of the impact of this product, we would want to observe how users interact with the shopping cart in real grocery stores as well.

While there are some limitations to our prototype, it also has some merits that existing systems don’t account for. Mainly, we eliminated the need for a customer to have a mobile app compatible phone, and we also do not require them to have an account to be able to use the system. These elements ensure accessibility that isn’t available in other systems.

We were also able to answer how customers would be able to purchase age-restricted items and items that do not typically have a barcode. For age-restricted items, we determined that a back-end implementation of items that have restrictions would be the best way to go. In this system, whenever an item is scanned that needs ID verification, the system will prompt users with a message stating that an employee is on the way to check their ID; the employee will then go through the process of putting in their code to approve the purchase, and the customer will be able to put the item in the cart.