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ACCESSIBLE DRIVE THRU

R&D Concepts Engineering Intern | Starbucks

Core Working Team

Lauren Nguyen

Consult

Stephanie L.

WID 

Support

Sydney B.

Koichi K.

Pramukh B.

Timeframe

8 weeks

Overview

A project to redesign Starbucks Drive Thrus for partners with disabilities. Through rapid prototyping, I was able to test prototypes to develop and share research backed findings  with stakeholders to make the workplace more accessible. This process includes:

Virtual Market Research

Field Research

Interviews

Focus Groups

Journey Map

Brainstorm

Design Solutions

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WID Usability Testing

Additional Surveys and Interviews

Summary of Findings

6 Tested Concepts

Future Steps

The Problem

As it stands, the current Starbucks Drive Thru space and technologies make it difficult for partners with disabilities to be successful in their roles. With 90% of new Starbucks Stores including Drive Thrus, this is a great opportunity to design with these partners in mind from the beginning and understand how to support them best. This leads to my design question: 

“How might we redesign Starbucks Drive Thrus to be accessible for partners that have limited hearing, vision, and mobility?

Research

Field Research

I started this project by conducting field research at a local Starbucks. The purpose being to gain an understanding of all the moving elements that make a Starbucks Drive Thru run successfully. This looks like observing and taking notes of operations, photographing the space from customer and partner perspectives, and asking partners clarifying questions.

Findings

  • There are 4 main roles I was able to observe:

    • DTR (Drive Thru Register): greets customer, hands off order to customer, takes payment

    • DTO (Drive Thru Operator): wears headset and takes order from customer, inputs order into POS, helps gather items to give to window role

    • Bar: puts label onto cups, makes drinks (cold, hot, blended), hands off drinks to POS

    • Warming: puts label onto bags, grab food items from fridge, warm food if needed, hands off food to POS

  • Roles have space to flex where help is needed and are not set in stone

  • Early identification of pain points for a barista with disability

Interviews

I conducted 3, semi-structured interviews with partners that have DT experience. The purpose being to dive deeper into the DT process, receive barista feedback of working in the space, identify pain points, and gather potential solutions. I hope to identify areas of improvement across partners without disability to later produce solutions that can benefit all partners. 

Findings

  • The main metric of success is customer wait time at window which oftentimes creates pressure on baristas (solutions should be directed at aiding this problem)

  • Limited amount of space in back making it difficult for a wheelchair user to be in the space

  • The best partner facing changes affect customer experience the least 

  • Baristas don't mind planted roles and staying stagnant within their role

  • Planted positions: DTR and DTO

  • Narrow down scope of project to focus on rethinking DTR and DTO roles rather than food and drink roles

Virtual Market Research

As many fast food restaurants and quick service establishments have Drive Thrus of their own, I found merit in researching existing strategies that other companies employ. This allows me to consider which of these strategies would work well in the scope of my accessible DT project. 

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Tacobell using elevator lift for Drive Thru

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2 way video screen in Starbucks Canada 2017

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Chick Fil a remote DT position

Understand

To work on a project intended for people with disability, it is imperative to work with this population and listen to their lived experiences. In doing so, it allows for a better understanding of their challenges that will lead to solutions grounded in experience rather than assumption.

Focus Groups

Fortunately I had the opportunity to sit in on focus groups led by WID (World Institute on Disability). These sessions were composed of 3 groups that identify with one of the following areas of disability: vision, mobility, and hearing. These groups were guided through various barista tasks and asked about how they would feel and go about completing these tasks.

Overall  Findings

Through cross referencing findings from field research, interviews, and focus groups, we were able to discover patterns and produce 3 major learnings and questions that would guide the remainder of this project.

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Vision: Blind or low vision partners cannot read item labels as well as the POS and expeditor screens. How might we redesign the roles or the technology so that a blind person can be on DTO or DTR without having to completely memorize the POS and expeditor screens?

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Mobility: With the current layout of Starbucks DTs, it is difficult for wheelchair users to navigate the space due to the POS and expeditor screens being out of reach, limited space in BOH, and the strenuous reach out the window. How might we redesign the space or the DTO/DTR roles to mitigate these issues?

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Hearing: With the current DTO and DTR routines, partners that are deaf cannot fulfill those roles because of the inability to verbally communicate with customers. Even with workarounds such as boogie boards, deaf partners are afraid of the frustration or inconvenience on both ends of communicating with hearing customers. How might we redesign these roles such that deaf partners can succeed in them?

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Journey Map
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Abridged journey map of barista steps outlining pain points for people with disability

Ideate | Prototype

Brainstorm

The next step is conducting a brainstorm session with a cross functional team of 6 partners. The goal of this brainstorm session being to rapidly ideate around 15 solutions for each disability. This brainstorm is guided by the user journey map above, how might we questions, and a comprehensive video outlining the barista process.

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From there, we were able to consolidate ideas and prioritize which to prototype based on feasibility and desirability.

Barista Process 

Prototype

During the prototype phase, I was able to produce 6 prototypes of varying fidelity. 2 prototypes (RDTO and Label Reader) were created and judged during a company wide hackathon.​ RDTO ended up winning the award for best customer facing hack and Label Reader received an honorable mention! 

Testing

Additional Surveys + Interviews

To gain additional insight on proposed solutions at this stage I conducted:

  • 3 supplementary interviews with partners with disability

  • Door and ledge preference survey administered to 11 partners with DT experience​

WID Testing

I worked closely with the World Institute on Disability (WID) to create test plans for these prototypes with participants of the target demographic. We were able to recruit 1 low vision, 1 blind, 1 deaf, and 1 wheelchair user as participants. In doing so, we are able to answer, "Are these technologies sufficient in enabling disables partners to work at a DT?" and subsequently, "What can be added or adjusted alongside these existing prototypes?"

Results
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Final Deliverables

  • 6 tested and reproducible concepts for assistive technology

  • 2 fledged out concept videos

  • Cumulative presentation on research, testing, findings, and future steps

  • Full documentation process

Future Steps

POS Alterations

  • Implement a screen reader with commonly ordered item buttons

  • Adding automated replies directily to POS

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Connect to the right people/teams, push these ideas

  • Emerging Technologies, LACR (Location Aware Customer Recognition), Store Design, Inclusive Design Strategy

  • How can accessibility work be incorporated into the beginning design stages for all new projects?

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