Foodventure – mobile digital platform restaurant waiting experience in the digital age

Lu, Fei

Permalink

https://hdl.handle.net/2142/93073 Copy

Description

Title

Foodventure – mobile digital platform restaurant waiting experience in the digital age

Author(s)

Lu, Fei

Issue Date

2016-07-20

Director of Research (if dissertation) or Advisor (if thesis)

Reeder, Kevin

Committee Member(s)

• Weightman, David
• Benson, Eric
• Karahalios, Karrie G.

Department of Study

Art & Design

Discipline

Art and Design

Degree Granting Institution

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Degree Name

M.F.A.

Degree Level

Thesis

Keyword(s)

• UI/UX Design
• Restaurant
• Waiting experience
• Social engagement
• Service design

Abstract

Nowadays, on average, U.S. adult eats 4.8 meals per week in restaurants (Zonca, 2013). The dining experience has become an integral part of everyday life, both for the restaurants financially and for customers who simply want to enjoy a good meal. However, popularity is almost always associated with long waiting time. This could lead to dissatisfaction overshadowing the quality of the food itself. Some would even choose to leave when they see a long waiting line in front of the restaurants. A better waiting line management system is needed to improve the waiting line experience and satisfy the impatient customers. Such a system can help restaurants gain new customers and grow brand recognition and loyalty. What should a diner’s waiting experience look like in the digital age? My work attempted to tackle this question by reinventing the waiting experience. It emphasized customer satisfaction, nudging adventurous foodies toward social engagement, and creating a culture of loyal customers in casual and fine dining restaurants. Casual dining restaurants focus mainly on the taste of their food and sometimes the promptness of the service, while fine dining restaurants offer the entire package – service, atmosphere, taste and presentation (Wikipedia). They each offer unique challenges that I aim to solve. Waiting is common yet unpleasant to many diners. But, if used in the correct way, the waiting process can be important to maintain or even increase customer satisfaction. If service provider has been putting money, time and attention to improve perceived quality of service, then investing in wait time optimization might as well result in significant payback. A waiting line is an important positive indicator to uninformed consumers. My thesis work is to create a social engagement process to nudge customers to find other adventurous foodies with similar dietary preferences who they can choose to share a table with. This can reduce objective waiting time and increase cognitive waiting time acceptance probability. Increased customer satisfaction then improves evaluation of the restaurant and promotes repeat purchases.

Graduation Semester

2016-08

Type of Resource

text

Permalink

http://hdl.handle.net/2142/93073

Copyright and License Information

Copyright 2016 Fei Lu

Owning Collections