Five products, one order: how to scope a delivery platform
Product · 3 min read
ClickToFood is a customer app, a rider app, a restaurant panel, an admin panel and an internal point of sale. It is tempting to plan that as five projects. We recommend planning it as one: the order.
Follow one order from start to finish
Write down each step an order goes through: placed, accepted, prepared, picked up, delivered. For every step, note who acts and what they need to see. That list gives you the screens for each app, and it shows where one app hands over to the next.
- PlacedCustomer
- AcceptedRestaurant
- PreparedRestaurant
- Picked upRider
- DeliveredRider
Share one set of statuses
When every app reads the same order record and the same status names, the customer, the rider and the restaurant never disagree about what is happening. Separate status lists per app are where most sync bugs start.
Launch a thin slice of everything
A polished customer app is no use if the restaurant cannot accept the order. Ship the simplest working version of every step first, then deepen each app.