Reducing store visits with instant price discovery

Summary

Cartna lets shoppers check price and availability at participating supermarkets using voice or text. It removes the need to visit the store just to see a price. It helps managers process orders faster.

Problem

• Finding the price of an item or whether it is in stock requires a trip to the supermarket.
• Shoppers waste time and make extra trips.
• Supermarket managers spend time answering calls and messages.
• Price opacity lowers trust and reduces impulse buys.

Target users

• Everyday shoppers in Rwanda who want fast price checks.
• Busy shoppers who prefer voice or short messages.
• Supermarket managers who want to process orders faster and sell more.

Hypothesis

If shoppers can ask for price and availability in natural language then they will save time and rely more on the supermarket for purchase decisions. Managers will get fewer manual requests and process orders faster.

Solution overview

Cartna is a simple app that answers natural language queries about price and availability for items at participating supermarkets. The app returns a clear reply with price, availability, branch, and options to add to cart. Managers get a lightweight dashboard for order processing and update key items.

Core features

• Voice and text search that accepts natural language queries.
• Instant answer card: price, in stock or out of stock, branch, and time of last update.
• Add to cart option from the result card.

UX flow highlights

1. Open app. Quick greeting. Tap mic or type.
2. User says or types a query like "price of maize flour at Veo" or "is Nescafe available in any store?"
3. User gets results with price, availability, branch, and an action button to add to cart if in stock.
4. If stock is uncertain, system gives other matching options via semantic matching.

Tech stack

Shots

Expected impact and metrics

• Fewer supermarket visits for price checks. Measure percent drop in price check trips.
• Faster order confirmations. Measure average time from query to order confirmation.
• Higher conversion from query to order. Measure conversion rate.
• Manager time savings. Measure number of manual calls/messages reduced.

Conclusion

Cartna demonstrated that a lightweight, conversational interface can meaningfully reduce friction for everyday price checks across supermarkets. By prioritizing clear answers and a simple store-side workflow, we sped up shopper decisions and reduced manual effort for managers.