Hihat is a mobile app that helps those with food allergies find restaurants, cafes, and other eating locations that will cater to or accommodate their specific diets and needs. Users will be able to find places that they can confidently go and eat with the validation from community reviews, see the menu, and view other specific details about restaurants on one platform.
Finding restaurants and other dining locations is a market dominated by products that help the population look for and review these places. The possibilities seem limitless unless you are someone who has food allergies and has specific dietary requirements. Over 15 million Americans have food allergies, with 1 out of every 3 kids who have a food allergy. Anyone can be allergic to any food, but the most common allergies are from Milk/Dairy, Eggs, Peanuts, Tree Nuts, Soy, Wheat/Gluten, Fish, and Shellfish. These are extremely common foods in day-to-day life, which can make it difficult to go out and find locations that are accommodating to those who have food allergies.
I created a survey using Google Forms and sent it out to try and gauge the variety of thoughts on going to restaurants with food allergies. Since this is a subject matter that is very niche, the type of answers I had to receive needed to come from a specific group. I spread it out among my peers, but I also reached out to forums on Reddit to see if I could get some interaction within the food allergy community. I was able to have a few conversations through this platform which gave me a better comprehension of experience depending on what food allergy the person may have and the severity of their allergy.
Through those online conversations and the survey results, I was able to validate what direction I should go in and figure out how to create a trustworthy and transparent environment for the food allergy community.
Going out to Eat
iPhone Users
Age Range
How People Search
The popular online methods include online blogs, reviews from Google, Yelp, Tripadvisor.
Word of Mouth is by the most popular, though.
Validating a Restaurant
Validating whether a restaurant is a possible place to explore, participants will review the restaurants' website to check the menu and gain any other information that they can find.
Concerns
The main concern that participants have when going to a restaurant is cross-contamination and having any options to choose from.
<aside> 📣 Overall, participants want to be informed and aware of what is going to be in their food. The more information and reassurance they have allows their experience to be a lot more comfortable.
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When it comes to searching for locations to dine and experience, the most significant competitors in this space are Google Reviews, Yelp, and FourSquare. Each of these companies has the technological infrastructure and has built communities of reviewers within their platforms to help validate their restaurants. When looking for more niche audiences, there are platforms like AllergyEats and Spokin, which cater specifically to people who have food allergies, but may not have the networks like the mentioned giants.
When we look closer at these competitors, companies like Yelp, Google Reviews, and FourSquare cater to large audiences. They cannot focus on the specific needs people with food allergies have. AllergyEats has the most similar goals/direction with Hihat, but improvement in the usability and UI of their application is something that Hihat aims to bring about on its platform.