ecoMi

Creating a sustainable future with Migros.

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Background

We all face the challenge of massively reducing our carbon footprint. Politicians worldwide have agreed on the so-called "2 degree target". According to this pledge, the global average temperature should only rise by a maximum of two degrees compared to the time before industrialization. To achieve this, CO2 emissions in the industrialized countries must fall by 80 to 95% by 2050 (compared to 1990 levels). In 2020, emissions in Switzerland have already fallen by around 44%, but there are still important efforts to be done.

Food production and processing is a significant portion of our contribution to climate change, with as much as 31% of greenhouse emissions attributed to feeding the population. The scale and precise sources of greenhouse gas emissions depend on factors such as the agricultural production methods, input and structures of the supply chain (see image below). Thus, the role of the food we eat has come into the spotlight in addressing climate change, and it is now evident how much we can all do to help global efforts by adapting our diets.

The pain points we are trying to solve

Most of us are aware of the threat of climate change and the impact our diet has on this topic. However, we don’t really know more about the details of our carbon footprint. How much CO2 do my eating habits generate? Is this CO2 related to production, packaging or transportation? Sometimes, we lack sufficient knowledge or time, to assess which products are better for the environment.

In 2021, in its effort to support the transition to a more sustainable future, Migros launched the M-Check for all its brands (which account to 80% of the products sold in their supermarkets). The M-Check is a sustainability score printed on the products packaging that shows how sustainable a product is on a scale of 1 to 5 stars. This scale intends to quickly and transparently show the product's carbon footprint or animal welfare. However, not everyone is aware of this new sustainability score. Furthermore, Migros would like to leverage technology to get consumers more engaged in buying sustainable products and this is why they launched the challenge at HackZurich in hope of inspiring clever, creative and of course fun solutions to gamify each and everyone’s shopping experience

Our solution

Looking to integrate with the existing Migros App, which is already linked to the consumers data and purchase history, we created an App that encourages the consumer to buy more sustainable products and get friends/family to join this challenge as a team by sharing a personal invite link. Together as a community they can visibly make more impact.

Each user can also personalize the sustainability aspect that they care about the most: CO2, animal welfare and/or water consumption and gain or lose points based on his/her purchases.

The app allows the user to be informed about his/her progress through time, visibly taking him/her through a sustainable journey. Customers can analyse how sustainable their past purchases were and see sustainability information broken down to the products level. On the product recommendation page the app suggests how you can shop more sustainably by suggesting alternative options which you can directly add to your shopping list. As he follows the recommendations, he collects points, badges and unlock rewards (Cumulus point coupons), encouraging him/her to keep up a positive trend in sustainable purchases.

The social element of the game is important as well, because as the tribe/community grows, so does the impact. The game also displays a leaderboard where individuals/teams compete in their sustainability journey.

Journey

  1. On-boarding Stage: a. User sensibilization with 3 informative screens b. Choose what you care about the most? c. Get Badge - “Motivated Change-maker” + Small Reward (for the hook) c. Home Screen: Shows the three least sustainable purchased products of the last 30 days with a more sustainable recommendation/substitute. Add-to-shopping-list button.
  2. Scaffolding Stage: a. If the user buys any of the recommended (or more sustainable) products the user collect points and eventually badges. b. When a milestone is reached, a reward is unlocked (Coupon-> automatically add to wallet) c. As the user progresses in the sustainability journey, the rewards get more exciting (5x, 10x, 15x, 25x, 50x, 100x) d. When someone joins the user’s team using the personalized invite link the user Collects a badge (“Leader”); after 5 more friends join then a new badge (“Climate innovator”), etc.
  3. Progress Stage: a. The user has a progress screen where his individual progress is shown as well as those who joined with his invite link. b. Another screen should visualise the collective progress the whole Migros community is making with their more sustainable purchases..
  4. Endgame Stage: When the journey in one map is finished, a new map starts (level unlocked) After completing 7 levels, the user is recognized as an expert or veteran and can be given some privileges for loyalty or be featured/mentioned in Migros social media. Or challenge runs for limited time (i.e. 3 months and then restarts with a new season - new functionalities or new rewards, to keep the reward system fresh)

How we built it

The frontend was build with Flutter. This allowed us to concentrate on one code base but make the app available for Android, iOS and web.

The frontend app communicates with the Backend over REST-API. The backend is implemented with Flask framework on python and hosted on Azure App Service The CI/CD pipeline is working directly connected with github repository of the backend.

The data provided by the Migros was stored into Mongo DB Atlas, their cloud offering. The backend consumes the data from there.

Challenges we ran into

  • Synchronization with 4 in-person and one remote participants
  • The datasets did not provide all the details we expected
  • There's not enough time for sleep
  • Searching for a quiet place to sync over video calls

Accomplishments that we're proud of

  • We've not known each other before and formed a well performing team
  • We've built three apps with own UI/UX design that are connected with the backend
  • Keeping both remote and local team members in the loop at every step of development.

What we learned

  • How to work together in a in-person and remote team
  • There's no meat product that is sustainable
  • Creating a database with individual sustainability ratings is an enormous task

What's next for ecoMi

  • Work together with Migros to improve the data to provide customers with more product specific sustainability ratings.
  • Explore more possibilities to connect teams of sustainable players.
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