Foodbytes: An App for Home-based Food Sellers

We are Canadian development practitioners working to empower the most vulnerable communities in the developing world; In 2020, Covid-19 has hit us hard here at home and have severely affected our communities here in Canada with people who lost their jobs and many businesses closing from the economic impacts of the pandemic. During this time, we saw a proliferation of small, home-based businesses selling food online through Facebook and other social media platforms as an adaptation mechanism.

As food lovers ourselves, we observed the challenges from ordering food through social media (no ordering systems resulting in missed or late orders), the lack of quality standards (compliance to food handling and safety procedures), and even potential health risks.

Hence, we are developing and designing an app that brings small food business sellers to the mainstream market, help professionalize their business and enable them grow. The app empowers them by eliminating a barrier to signing up with the mainstream food delivery app services (Doordash, Skip, Ubereats) with an app-based solution and tools designed for part-time or full-time food entrepreneurs to manage their home-based business. The app enables them to grow their business by providing low- transaction costs and fees for using the platform's features (e-transfer payments, delivery by seller or pick-up), improving the financial viability and decreased costs of doing business.

Importantly, the app is specifically designed for them to help meet their operational needs (such as flexibility on opening and closing their store, putting a menu item offline if an ingredient for a dish is missing; pre-booking system, featuring multi-cultural dishes, etc.) The app was co-created with them during the app design and development process.

The objective of this fundraising campaign is to help us raise $1,000 to be given away as $10 discount coupons to 1st time customers in Toronto and Ottawa who will download and use the Foodbytes app to support our home-based chefs and food sellers!