Boons Inc.
2024 - 2025
Empowering independent restaurants with an online platform
Designing the core consumer and restaurant experiences for an early-stage food-ordering startup serving independent restaurants in the Bay Area.
Overview
Designing both sides of a food-ordering ecosystem
Boons is a restaurant technology startup that helps owner-operated restaurants connect directly with customers through online ordering and restaurant-management tools.
As the primary product and user experience designer, I worked across both sides of the ecosystem. I built the consumer web experience, designed the customer mobile app experience, and redesigned the restaurant-facing app used to manage orders.
At an early-stage startup, my role also extended into product copy, marketing, branding, and investor storytelling.
What I Owned
Consumer ordering website
Designed the end-to-end web ordering journey, from restaurant discovery and menu browsing through checkout and order tracking.
Consumer mobile app
Translated the ordering experience into a mobile app designed to support convenient and repeat ordering.
Restaurant experience
Redesigned the merchant-facing interface restaurants used to monitor orders, manage their storefronts, and support promotions.
The Impact
180%
Increase in site visits within the first month of launch
32%
Increase in leads & restaurant onboarding
Problem
Boons needed to create value for two audiences at the same time
Boons faced a classic two-sided marketplace challenge: restaurants would only see value if customers used the platform, while customers needed a convenient ordering experience and enough restaurant options to return.
At the same time, both groups already had strong expectations shaped by established ordering platforms. Boons needed to make the operational experience simple while also demonstrating a clear business benefit for restaurant owners. For customers, the platform cannot have unnecessary friction or unfamiliar interactions.
How might we create a cohesive experience that makes ordering attractive for customers while keeping order management intuitive for restaurant operators?
Research
Learning from experience and adapting to limited resources
With startup timelines and limited resources, research happened alongside design rather than as a separate formal phase. I used competitive analysis, restaurant stakeholder conversations, customer feedback, and internal product discussions to guide decisions. I also drew heavily from my own experience working in an owner-operated restaurant, which helped ground decisions in fast-paced service environments and the day-to-day constraints managing food orders in real time.
Key Things to Keep in Mind
01
Familiarity builds trust
Customers already know how food ordering works. Boons needed to follow those existing patterns so users could understand and order quickly without learning something new.
02
Speed matters differently for restaurants
Many restaurant owners are not highly tech-savvy and work under time and cost pressure. The merchant experience had to be simple, clear, and avoid visual complexity.
"When we're busy, I don't have time to figure out the tablet."
03
Remember Boons' goals
Connect the consumer and restaurant experiences into one consistent system.
Mapping the original Boons product before brainstorming changes.
Exploration & Iteration
Exploring the experience across three products
With the broader, original system mapped, I began exploring how customers and restaurants would interact interact Boons across the web, mobile, and the merchant tablet.
Consumer Web
Exploring different dashboard concepts focused on hierarchy, transaction visibility, and clearer everyday financial workflows.
Consumer App
Exploring different dashboard concepts focused on hierarchy, transaction visibility, and clearer everyday financial workflows.
Merchant Tablet
Exploring different dashboard concepts focused on hierarchy, transaction visibility, and clearer everyday financial workflows.
Final Product
Turning early ideas into Live Products
Consumer Web
A straightforward website that highlights Boons' new catering service.
Consumer App
Consumer designed to match with the website.
Merchant Tablet
A simplified order management process focused on visibility like large buttons and important information.
Lessons
Designing within real-world constraints
My work helped turn ideas into experiences used by both customers and restaurants, directly supporting early company growth. More importantly, this work gave me hands-on experience designing in a fast-moving startup, where every decision was made with limited research and time, all the while balancing user needs, technical constraints, business goals, and speed to market.
