[In God we Trust, In Bread We Crust] shoe-perheroes

Context

Singaporeans buy 22 million pairs of shoes every year, often to replace existing pairs. They throw out many usable shoes that still have much lifespan. On the other hand, the large low-income migrant worker demographic constantly need new shoes, but are budget-constrained. As such, how might we create a circular economy for used shoes, giving them a second life and preventing them from being thrown away prematurely?

Solution: Shoe-perheroes

The Shoe-perheroes ecosystem comprises an app and collection kiosk, the Shoebox. The app uses computer vision to validate that donors' shoes are still usable, and directs them to the nearest dropoff point, the Shoebox kiosks. Shoebox kiosks collect donors' shoes and tag each pair to donors' accounts.

Donors are able to follow the journey of their shoes from their dropoff to reaching the final recipients, similar to package tracking with registered mail.

Recipients are able to connect with donors over the app via a chat function, with the hope of creating a new friendship between donor and recipient, creating greater mutual awareness while increasing donors' sense of fulfillment, thereby avoiding donor fatigue and encouraging donors to continue donating shoes.