Case Study • Mobile App • Consumer • UX Research

FoodFlix Mobile App

Personal Project

FoodFlix is a consumer mobile app that pairs movies, TV shows, and sports with food — whether ordering delivery, browsing local restaurants, or cooking a recipe at home. It began as a personal observation, grew into a graduate thesis, and became a funded, user-tested, iterative product.

Role Concept Creator • CEO • User Research • Market Research • Developer Oversight • Funding • UI Lead

Year 2020–2025

Origin

How It Began

The Spark

My wife and I planned a snowed-in weekend of Italian wine and pizza while watching The Godfather series. I thought — can the meal be more robust than pizza? Where could I find a better match to the food in the movie? And ultimately: were there different problems I could solve, beyond the delightful end-user result?

The Opportunity

That question opened into something bigger: two entire industries — streaming and food delivery — were both under serious pressure from the same demographic behaviors. Connecting them in a single, frictionless experience had never been done. Not by anyone.

Two Industries, Three Problems

Streaming Churn

When a new season of a favorite show dropped, viewers would binge it and cancel. Gen Z and Millennials were savvy about how much they would spend — subscribing, watching what they wanted, then leaving. Churn and return was eroding platform revenue.

Choice Overload

The average person spends 110 hours per year scrolling through streaming services, struggling to find something worth watching. Rising subscription costs were driving cancellations, and the endless scroll had become a source of frustration, not delight.

Delivery Fee Squeeze

Food delivery platforms saw Pandemic-era profits gutted by app fees. A $39 Panda Express family meal carried a 49% markup on Uber Eats. Restaurant commission fees alone ran 15–30%. Platforms needed new ways to create value beyond price competition.

Industry Context

What the Industry Was Already Trying

01

Ad-Supported Tiers

Deloitte research found that watching ads in exchange for lower costs — or no cost — was the most popular strategy streaming platforms were pursuing. It was effectively a return to television's original model.
02

Delivery Expansion

McKinsey found that food delivery platforms were attempting to add value by expanding delivery to other goods such as alcohol, pharmaceuticals, and groceries — a race to become logistics platforms rather than food-specific services.
03

Platform Competition

McKinsey: 'These platforms will continue to fight one another. This battle will extend beyond restaurants, as platforms widen the scope of services.' And critically: 'The evolving food-delivery ecosystem requires, and will likely reward, creativity. One potential example: combining dining and television...'

Project Requirements

Alleviate Frustration

Reduce viewer exhaustion and frustration from endless-scroll decision fatigue across fragmented streaming services.

Show the Perfect Match

Use APIs to build a robust database that matches a viewing choice with a relevant food option — and vice versa.

Improve Revenue

Offer food service providers a new revenue channel after Pandemic-era delivery fees cut into profits. Offer streaming services a reason to retain subscribers.

Add Value to Platforms

Expand platform value in a direction Deloitte and McKinsey both identified as an opportunity: combining entertainment with food in a single, intentional experience.

Research — Stakeholder Interviews

Entertainment Industry Perspective

David Harris Katz

Multi-Emmy Award-Winning Executive Producer. Creator of 'Wow, I Never Knew That!' (Whoopi Goldberg, Exec. Prod.) and 'Date While You Wait.' CEO, EIFTV Network & Distribution.
David felt there were too many binge shows with story arcs spanning full seasons, leading to viewer burnout and churn after the series ended. He also noted the irony of the 'free with ads' model: that was how television began.'

Adam Rackoff

Filmmaker and Award-winning Producer of 'The Brainwashing of My Dad'; Co-Founder of Cinco Dedos Peliculas with Matthew Modine.
Adam's view: 'You can't get everything on Netflix anymore, as other companies have created their own services. Netflix's original content is all over the map for quality. There's no monopoly service anymore, and it depends on personal taste.'

Comparative Competitive Analysis

So close, and yet so far

There are similar themes in various websites, books and social media profiles. However, none of them are actually 'connecting all the dots' to put everything in one place

FoodFlix user flow chart showing movie-to-food and food-to-movie paths

Research — Survey

18 respondents of varying backgrounds and regions across the U.S. confirmed the behavioral link between watching and eating — and pointed to a clear unmet need.

55% Binge watch a show 5–7 nights per week

33% Order food specifically to eat with a show

88%+ Order food at least 1–2 times per week

66% Sometimes watch while eating; 33% always do

Top streaming services at time of survey

FoodFlix survey results showing popular show and food pairings

Research — Pain Points

What People Wished They Had

Food

Users wanted restaurant specials surfaced without searching; healthier options presented without filtering; and wider delivery radius coverage. Several users in areas underserved by delivery apps asked for recipes as a fallback — pairing the experience even when delivery wasn't available.

Movies & Shows

Users wanted personalized recommendations, not just editorial top-10 lists. They wanted to see what others in their circle were watching, compare watchlists across platforms, and find films based on previous viewing history — a feature no single platform offered across all services.

Personas

Who We Were Designing For

Date Night

John

Invites Maria over to watch The Godfather and wants to impress her with an authentic Italian meal straight from the movie.

Wants food that matches the film's setting
Not a confident cook — prefers delivery
Motivated by wanting to make the evening special

Girls' Night

Natasha

Catching up with college friends visiting from out of town. They love romantic comedies, cooking, and vegetarian meals.

Group decision-making dynamic
Has dietary preferences to consider
Values the social ritual of choosing together

Solo Chill

Alexandra

Loves relaxing after a busy work week with new recipes and a movie on Friday nights. She's been doing this for a while and seeks fresh ideas.

Experienced home cook — wants recipes, not just delivery
Looking for discovery, not just convenience
Loyal to the ritual; wants variety within it

Design — Flow Mapping

Get to the Result in the Fewest Steps — and Make It Fun

The core design goal was to minimize decision friction while adding a sense of play. The flow had to work in both directions: start with a movie and find food, or start with food and find a movie. Pick For Me was introduced early as a key escape valve for users who just wanted to skip the choosing entirely.

Prototyping

The Bubble-Drop Concept

FoodFlix early flow sketches — Early flow sketches

Testing — Round 1

Five Participants, Two Key Findings

What They Liked

Users responded positively to the About the movie section, the drag-and-drop genre selection, and Pick For Me. The gamified interaction felt fresh and the core concept clicked immediately. Quotes: 'I don't have to think!' 'FUN!' 'Cool… really easy.'

What They Wanted

The top request from all five participants: the ability to save their preferred delivery app. Users also wanted to choose more than one genre, a more prominent search feature, and the ability to swap out the food or movie suggestion after it was generated.

Testing — Round 2

Iterated Prototype, Three Tasks

What Was Added

Based on Round 1 feedback: the ability to choose more than one genre, the ability to change the food type suggestion, and a more prominent search. Live moderated sessions gave participants three tasks: find a Fellini film and order Italian food; pick an animated film and view recipes; use Pick For Me and pass the first offer.

Results

Users praised Pick For Me, the clean layout, and movie descriptions. New requests: swap the meal or movie after pairing, save favorite recipes, connect to local restaurants. One trend: confusion about what the meal suggestion circles actually represented — a visual clarity issue flagged for the next iteration.

Research Pivot

Is There a Connection Between Personality and What People Watch — and Eat?

After two rounds of testing, a deeper question emerged: could the app become smarter over time? Research published in a National Institutes of Health study confirmed the connection: the connections between personality and entertainment preference suggest people seek out entertainment that reflects and reinforces aspects of their personalities. Myers-Briggs types correlate to distinct film genre preferences, and — according to Susan Storm of Psychology Junkie — to food preferences as well. The Personality DataBase (PDB), with over 2 million profiles, offered a potential API source for machine learning-based suggestions.

Top of manuscript linking personality to genres of media

The API Architecture

Movies & Streaming

TMDB (The Movie Database) provides descriptions, imagery, and streaming availability — telling us which services carry each title and where to watch it.

Food & Location

Food pairings correlate to the geographic setting of the film, using GPS-based API calls to TripAdvisor to surface relevant nearby restaurants.

Personality & Prediction

The Personality DataBase (PDB) paired with machine learning enables stronger future suggestions based on a user's previous selections and personality indicators.