Abstract | |
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Sous Chef is a project that revolves around the Computer Productivity Initiative (CPI) at
Old Dominion University and Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR). The goal of Sous Chef is
to solve an important problem that concerns many grocery shoppers today and to help grocery stores
improve their profit margins. Many grocery shoppers go to the grocery store unprepared. They do
not know exactly what they want to eat, what they already have in their home, what kinds of meals
they can prepare with the goods provided by the grocery store, which meals cater to their diets and
tastes, and how to prepare these meals. Grocery stores would benefit from a system that helps its
shoppers in making all of these decisions. In addition, our solution will help grocery stores in
advertising the items they need to push, thus “building the shopper’s basket.” Sous Chef will be
able to do this in real-time.
Sous Chef is a system that incorporates a database of recipes with the grocery store’s database
of goods. With the combined data from these two databases, Sous Chef will be able to match recipes
to items that need to be advertised, and to recipes that grocery shoppers want. The output of Sous
Chef is an electronic, touch-screen kiosk that incorporates a simple, yet powerful graphical user
interface. From the kiosk shoppers will be able to log in if they choose so that Sous Chef may remember a grocery shopper’s tastes, needs, and shopping patterns. Shoppers will be able to plan a number of meals; from merely that night’s meal to a set of meals for the entire week (Planning meals for a month would require the shopper to be at the kiosk probably longer than they would want to stand there. Also, the store may have problems with lines of frustrated shoppers waiting to use the kiosk). Another feature of the Sous Chef system is that a shopper will be able to access his or her profile and plan meals from home through a web-based interface. During the planning process, a customer may input various preferences. Sous Chef will return a list of recipes that complies with the preferences, factoring in any special items that the grocery store would like to sell that week (or day, or month). If a customer runs across a recipe instruction that he or she does not recognize, a short instructional video may be viewed for clarification. After the meals are planned, the customer may print out recipe instructions, grocery list, and even coupons. The grocery shopper leaves the kiosk confident in what he or she will be having for dinner. The grocery store is happy that it can push the products it wants to and that the shopper will return to use the store’s convenient kiosk. | |