Research for Group Project: Bette and Gabby

There are quite a few apps out there that contain the aspects we had in mind for our  new app. Below are a few of the apps I found that contained similar descriptions and aspects that we had.

Su Chef:

Su Chef is a free app available for IOS users. It allows you to enter in all of the ingredients in your fridge by text or voice command. It then can search for recipes containing some or all of the ingredients you have entered. On a separate screen you can manually search for recipes by determining main ingredients, types of food, meal, and time you want. Once a recipe is found it can be added to your favorites and ingredients can be added to a shopping list. I found this app to be frustrated in a couple of ways. The  manual recipe search doesn't take into account the ingredients you have. When entering ingredients the app seemed to have a hard time recognizing what food you had entered. The shopping list is just that, a shopping list. It doesn't have the added features we discussed in having delivery of those ingredients, closest store carrying particular ingredients, or prices. This app is very elementary but overall a good start. Our app will beat all aspects of this app in usability and content hands down.

Epicurious

Epicurious is another recipe search app. This one has a large following and contains recipes from epicurious itself. This one is also similar to the su chef app but a lot more complex. This app does not contain the option to enter the ingredients you already have in your fridge. Epicurious is like a pinterest for recipes. The app provides various categories to browse through including recipes that are in season to recipes for oscar party snacks. The search option categories are constantly updated. If you find a recipe appealing you can then add it to your recipe box, which is where it stores all of your favorite recipes. This app also has a grocery list option, allowing you to click on the ingredients needed and it is then saved to a standard list. Again no extent after that like we would like with our app. What is interesting about this app is the vast majority of recipes available for the users as well as step by step instructions when following the recipe. It does not have the voice command option that we would like for our app in regards to the step by step cooking process. 

Big Oven 

Big Oven is another app closely related to su chef and epicurious. you can look through a large variety of recipes (350,000 +), favorite the ones you like, and create a shopping list. What is unique about this app is the menu planning option. This is very helpful for families living on a budget. this way you can plan out all of your meals for the week and only go to the store once to pick up the needed ingredients. Again it doesn't have all the features we would like our app to have. The need for options regarding ingredient delivery, distance to stores, and prices is still out there. That could definitely be our niche. Another downfall for this app is its "left overs" option. It only allows you to input 3 ingredients and will pull up options for those few ingredients. still making it a necessity to go to the store and buy more food. 

While doing my research I found a handful of other apps closely related to the ones above. All with the same basic principle. A Pinterest for the foodie. I then began to try and find apps that focused on our idea of notifying you when you are running low on staple ingredients. I found only a few. 

Fresh Box 

Fresh box allows you to enter the ingredients you have purchased and then provides an easy way to see how much you have left as well as the estimated expiration date. What I find to be pretty awesome with this app is the capability it has to determine what you have in your fridge just by taking a photo! Granted you have to take a photo for each one though... its like an instagram for your food. It then calculates the life and amount of the food you have. The app will alert you when the expiration date is nearing and allows you to then transfer that particular food item to your shopping list. You can also remove the food item once you have finished it so your fridge in your app is always up to date. Our app will be different again in the way it notifies you when you are almost out of an ingredient, not just when it is close to its expiration date. While i love the just take a picture ability, I find it to be a pain to take a picture of each individual object. Can't we just scan the entire fridge in one sweeping motion? I find that if the technology is available, i would much rather save my time. 

Best Before 

Best Before is an app specifically for android users and its closely related to fresh box for IOS users. It has the picture taking option as well as notifications when the item will expire. This also provides a color coded count down for each individual item. This does not provide a shopping list and seems pretty limited in its usability.



From what I have found from my research of other apps, so far, is that while some contain aspects of our app, our app brings it all into one. We also provide a more extensive usability option, ease of use, voice activated recipe guides, ingredient delivery, total cost of ingredients when taking into account travel time as well as what stores have the cheapest ingredient, the option to download cook books from favorite chefs and subscribe to visual tutorials are the harder desserts you want to try, and it incorporates what you have in your fridge even if you are doing a standard recipe search. I think our app will be very successful because of its all in one capability. We can do this!