Overview

The SuperCoff Recipe App redesigns drink preparation as a structured, accessible system rather than a memory-based task.

By centralizing recipes and guiding baristas through clear steps, it reduces cognitive load, improves speed and accuracy, and supports consistent output under pressure. Informed by real café experience and validated through testing, the solution directly addresses breakdowns in recall, onboarding, and workflow efficiency.

The result is a more reliable system that improves both individual performance and overall quality control in daily operations.

Note: This project is still in progress and continues to be refined through ongoing iteration and testing.

Problem

Baristas face everyday challenges:

  • Quickly recalling multiple drink recipes under pressure

  • Maintaining consistency for taste and quality

  • Onboarding new staff efficiently

  • Training and feedback are inconsistent

Without a structured system, cafés risk lost revenue, unhappy customers, and frustrated employees.

Goal

The design approach focuses on turning complex workflows into simple, repeatable actions.

Key principles:

  • Reduce cognitive load during peak hours

  • Prioritize speed of access over complexity

  • Use structured steps instead of long-form instructions

  • Reinforce consistency through repetition

  • Support both learning and performance in the same system.

Users

Primary Users — Baristas

  • Experienced: Need fast access to recipes

  • New hires: Need guidance and training

  • Goal: Deliver consistent, high-quality drinks efficiently

Secondary Users — Café Managers

  • Need oversight of staff performance

  • Want training support and recipe standardization

User Personas

Sofia Rossi (27, Barista)

Goals

  • Maintain consistency across all drinks

  • Work efficiently during busy shifts

  • Support and guide team members

Pain Points

  • Inconsistent recipe knowledge across staff

  • Lack of quick access to standardized instructions

  • High time pressure during peak hours

Key Insights

  • Experienced baristas still rely on fast, reliable references in high-pressure situations
    Consistency is essential for both product quality and team alignment

How the Supercoff Recipes App Solves This

  • Provides instant access to standardized recipes

  • Reduces decision time during busy shifts

  • Ensures consistency across the team while supporting collaboration

Lukas Müller (Barista ,22, New Employee)

Goals

  • Learn recipes quickly and accurately

  • Build confidence during shifts

  • Minimize mistakes

Pain Points

  • Difficulty remembering steps and measurements

  • Feeling overwhelmed in fast-paced environments

  • Limited access to clear, structured training materials

Key Insights

  • New employees need simple, step-by-step guidance to learn effectively
    Confidence grows when information is accessible and easy to follow

How the SuperCoff Recipes App Solves This

  • Offers clear, structured, and easy-to-follow recipes

  • Acts as an on-the-job support tool

  • Helps reduce errors and builds confidence through consistency

Key Insight

Baristas are more likely to follow standardized procedures when information is easy to access, actionable, and integrated into daily workflow.
Small nudges, clear steps, and quick feedback can turn best practices into habits.

Usability & Workflow Study

Objective

Test how baristas interact with a low-fidelity prototype and understand:

  • How quickly they find recipes

  • If they follow steps consistently

  • How rewards or feedback influence habit formation

Study Design

Participants:

  • 6 baristas at SuperCoff

  • Mixed experience (new hires + experienced)

Scenario:

  • Open the app to prepare 3 popular drinks

  • Follow step-by-step recipes

  • Receive immediate feedback on completed drinks

  • “Reward” system: if done correctly each barista receives a tip, and appreciation.

Key Findings:

  • Users completed recipes 20–30% faster than without guidance

  • Immediate feedback increased confidence and accuracy

  • New hires reported feeling less overwhelmed and more likely to repeat proper workflow

  • Positive reinforcement (Tip/ Appreciation) encouraged habit formation

Insights from Testing:

  • Small feedback loops and visual guidance turn daily recipes into repeatable habits.
    Even minimal reward structures can increase engagement and consistency.

Features

Quick Access Recipes

  • Problem: Baristas waste time searching , inconsistent recipes, no structure.

  • Solution: Categorized, searchable recipes.

Step-by-Step Instructions

  • Problem: Risk of mistakes under pressure

  • Solution: Clear, visual steps with timers and reminders

Feedback & Appreciation

  • Problem: Hard to track Barista performance with lack of guidance and an easy system to use.

  • Solution: Saved Recipes and feedback provided to Baristas, highly appreciate Barista‘s consistency.

Featured & Most Ordered Drinks

  • Problem: Baristas need to quickly identify and access the most popular or high-priority drinks during peak hours, but standard recipe lists can slow down workflow and create delays.

  • Solution: A dedicated “Featured & Most Ordered Drinks” section that highlights popular and high-priority beverages, allowing faster access and more efficient service during busy periods.

User Flow

The user flow is designed to support speed and clarity during fast-paced café operations. Baristas can quickly access relevant drinks, follow structured preparation steps, and complete tasks with minimal friction.

The flow begins on the home screen, where featured and most ordered drinks are prioritized for quick access. After selecting a drink, baristas are guided through clear, step-by-step instructions that reduce cognitive load and ensure accuracy. Once the drink is completed, the process reinforces itself through repetition, allowing baristas to build familiarity and confidence over time.

This streamlined flow ensures that both experienced and new baristas can work efficiently while maintaining consistent quality.

Consistency Loop

The Consistency Loop is designed to turn standardized recipes into repeatable habits that ensure quality control across all baristas.

By consistently following the same structured steps, baristas produce drinks with the same quality regardless of experience level. Each completed drink reinforces the workflow, reducing reliance on memory and minimizing variation in preparation.

Over time, this repetition builds a reliable system where consistency becomes part of the daily routine rather than an extra effort. The result is a more efficient workflow, improved confidence among staff, and a consistent customer experience.

Design System

For Supercoff, the chosen typefaces — Inter Extra Bold, Inter Regular, and Inter Light — are selected to support clarity, speed, and usability in a fast-paced café environment. Their clean and highly legible design ensures quick readability during busy shifts, where information needs to be accessed instantly. The strong typographic hierarchy allows key actions and important recipe details to stand out through Extra Bold, while Regular and Light weights provide structure and readability for supporting content. This balanced use of weights creates a clear, efficient, and consistent visual system that reduces cognitive load and supports smooth workflow execution.

Color Palette

The Supercoff color palette is built around the main brand colors, orange and light green, which bring warmth, freshness, and energy to the interface while reflecting the dynamic atmosphere of a café environment. These primary colors help highlight key actions and interactive elements, making the experience more intuitive and engaging during fast-paced use.

Supporting these are secondary tones of white, black, and navy. White is used as a clean foundation to ensure clarity and readability across screens, while black provides strong contrast for text and essential information. Navy is used selectively, particularly in the navigation bar, to create a subtle sense of depth and structure while maintaining a calm and professional feel. Together, the palette creates a balanced system that supports usability, hierarchy, and a smooth user experience.

Outcome ( Expected )

The SuperCoff Recipe App transforms drink preparation from a memory-based process into a clear, consistent system.

With fast, step-by-step guidance, it reduces cognitive load during busy shifts and helps baristas work faster, more accurately, and with greater confidence. Early testing showed fewer errors and improved performance, especially for new staff.

It also establishes a shared standard across the team, leading to more consistent quality and a better overall customer experience.

Reflection

This project highlighted the importance of designing for real-world conditions, where time pressure and environment shape user behavior.

It showed that simplicity, clarity, and speed are far more effective than feature-heavy solutions—especially in high-pressure settings. While personal experience helped identify key pain points, testing was essential to validate them across users.

Next, the focus is on testing higher-fidelity versions in real café shifts and refining the app to better support both training and daily operations.

Why This Project Matters?

This project demonstrates my ability to design beyond interfaces and address operational challenges through thoughtful, user-centered systems. It highlights how UX can directly impact real-world performance by improving efficiency, reducing errors, and enabling consistency at scale.

SuperCoff is not just a recipe app, but a system for quality control, behavior reinforcement, and workflow optimization. It reflects my approach to design as a tool for solving practical problems, aligning user needs with business goals, and creating solutions that are both usable and meaningful in everyday contexts.

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