CleanTeam: Gamified Chore Tracker App

Role

As the project manager for the team, I oversaw the development process, from setting timelines and deliverables to managing assets and code files. I led the creative direction, naming the product, designing the logo, mascot, color palette, typography, and graphics.

On the technical side, I developed some of the key app functionalities, including the Nudge messaging feature, group creation, and leaderboard systems, while also designing the user interface. Additionally, I created marketing collateral, including ad posters and the project website, to support our launch efforts.

Overview

CleanTeam is a gamified chore-tracking app for young adults that focuses on the communication aspect of sharing a space. We offer a solution to roommate cleaning woes by getting to the heart of the problem: making it easier to talk about chores. Over the past year, I have worked in collaboration with two team members to bring this vision to life. In doing so we have created CleanTeam’s brand identity and marketing materials, conducted market and user research, and developed the front end and back end of the CleanTeam iOS mobile app.

Problem

No one wants a sink full of dirty dishes or an overflowing trash can, but talking to roommates about chores can feel confrontational, or just plain awkward. Having lived with roommates in the past and struggling with this issue is what inspired my teammates and me to find a solution to this problem. However, to ensure that this was an issue experienced by more people than just us, we conducted initial user research.

According to our research, many young adults (18–24) struggle with communicating with roommates when it comes to chores and would rather do everything themselves than “create a fuss.” However, the underlying problem in many of these cases is a lack of communication about chore assignments and accountability. This insight led us to develop a solution that addresses both the surface-level issue of cleanliness and the deeper problem of communication breakdown.

Creating a mobile app seemed like a clear solution — college-age young adults are digital natives. After some competitive analysis, we found that the existing chore management apps on the market were either designed for families with children, required a subscription, or were only intended for individual use. This gap in the market left the perfect place for us to begin working on a solution specifically for young adults with roommates. Enter, CleanTeam.

Solution

Feeling energized & excited by an idea we felt our generation could genuinely benefit from, we got to work. But, there was a lot to do to get the app to its final 1.0 version. We needed to:

• Decide on core features that would make our app stand out
• Create editorial & brand guidelines for our product
• Design wireframes for the app & code a beta version for testing
• Conduct user testing & research
• Create marketing materials
• Apply changes from user testing & finish the 1.0 version of the app

PHASE 1: Ideation & Creation

In the first stage, we brain-dumped on a shared FigJam board, which is a little nostalgic to look back on now as it tells the whole story of the CleanTeam app, from where we started to where we ended up.

In drafting what CleanTeam would look like, we each drew rough sketch wireframes and chose the designs and features from each that we liked the most and then implemented those in a higher fidelity prototype.

Early on, we settled on a few core features for our product:

• Collaborative to-do list to manage the roommates’ chores
• Leaderboard that displayed points earned by completing chores
• Rewards & punishments (inspired by Fantasy Football) achieved at at certain point value to motivate roommates to keep up their chore
• Nudges for users to anonymously ask their roommates to make sure they’re staying on top of their chores.

Once we settled on the structure of the app, it was time to focus on its look and feel. In creating our brand identity, we drew inspiration from Duolingo’s design system, falling in love with their mascot, witty voice, and fun, colorful elements.

This motivated us to create our own witty mascot. Original iterations included a duster and soap bubble. However, these felt too literal and left little room to play. Therefore, we decided on a turtle named Terry, as the steady pace and calm demeanor of the turtle symbolized users’ consistent and organized approach to completing chores, and would hopefully be too cute to get mad at.

We fleshed out the rest of our design system and began applying our style guidelines to a beta version of the app, and watched as CleanTeam started to come to life. In this phase of the project, Yotam handled most of the app development, while Madison & Erin worked primarily on branding. The beta version was presented to consultants, who gave us feedback on the idea, and tips on how to move forward going into user testing.

PHASE 2: User Research

We then conducted user testing over the course of two weeks.

What We Did Well

We were excited to find out that Terry resonated with our audience, with testers describing him as “friendly,” “approachable,” and “calming.” We also found that users seemed to like our concept overall, and that they would be likely to try out the CleanTeam app with their current roommates.

What We Needed to Improve

PHASE 3: Final Touches & Publication

The final phase of development was also time for us to address a pretty crucial part of our project that we had been ignoring: the backend.

We set up a simple version of the backend during the first phase of development, but no one in the team had much experience with computer science or data. We used the initial framework from our beta app as a model for all the other data structures we’d need for the final version, including a “Roomie” struct that would allow multiple roommates to collaborate in an account on the app. This period of development involved a lot of late nights, but was one of the most rewarding parts of the capstone experience.

Results

After months of development, we finally had a solution to the problem we identified at the start of our journey. We hope that by using CleanTeam, roommates will become closer outside of the app, and feel more comfortable discussing chores in real life.

Download from the app store today and say goodbye to roommate horror stories and hello to CleanTeam, the chore management solution that works for you.

Visit our full site here.

Access our source code here.