Case Study

Mac N Cheese Bar is a Chicago-area comfort food concept built around a simple, joyful premise: really good mac and cheese, customized your way. The brand had a great concept and a loyal in-person following but no digital presence capable of supporting growth beyond its original location.

The Challenge

The goal was measurable and practical: design and launch a full website and online ordering experience within 90 days, with a target of driving at least 100 online orders per month by the end of month 3. The brand needed to feel fun and unpretentious while still functioning reliably enough that a food truck schedule change wouldn’t break the UX.

My Role

As Designer and Developer, I handled both sides of the equation. I designed the brand guidelines, UI system, and all marketing graphics — then built and deployed the site, integrated the online ordering flow, and set up the social media templates the team uses independently to this day.

What We Achieved

  • Site live in 78 days, 12 days ahead of the 90-day target
  • Hit 130+ online orders per month by end of month 3, exceeding the 100-order goal by 30%
  • Developed a social template system enabling the owner to produce on-brand posts in under 10 minutes
  • Designed 3 limited-time promotional campaigns that drove measurable foot-traffic spikes during the first summer
  • Reduced average order pickup confusion through a simple UX improvement that cut order modification calls by roughly 40%
Process

How We Got There

Brand

Defined brand guidelines including logo, color palette, typography, and photography direction before touching the site — ensuring the visual system was in place before any page was built.

Design

Designed every UI screen at mobile and desktop fidelity in Figma, mapping the full ordering flow from menu discovery through confirmation.

Build

Built and configured the Squarespace site with integrated online ordering, SEO foundations, and a component set the owner could update independently.

Social Templates

Designed a social media template library covering weekly specials, location announcements, and seasonal promotions — enabling the owner to post in under 10 minutes.

Launch

Site launched 12 days ahead of schedule. Monitored order flow and UX analytics for the first 4 weeks, making minor optimizations that contributed to exceeding the 100-order monthly goal.

Reflection

Lessons Learned

Speed matters most when the client is the operator

For a small business owner running the food truck daily, every extra minute of setup or editing is a real cost. Designing for operator speed — not just customer UX — was the right priority.

Templates are a product, not a deliverable

The social media templates I handed off outlasted the website engagement. Designing them as a genuinely usable product — not just a file — was what made them valuable long-term.

Simple UX improvements beat feature additions

The 40% reduction in order modification calls came from one layout change on the confirmation screen, not a new feature. Clarity is almost always the highest-leverage optimization.