PawPrints

Between 2010 and 2020, more than 250 pets lost their lives either during or right after air travel.

In cargo, animals suffer temperature extremes, leaving pet owners emotionally torn, struggling to hold transport companies accountable amid the elusive reasons behind their pets' distress.Pets are family, and ensuring their safety during air travel is paramount. Limited alternatives force owners to entrust their beloved animals to major companies, causing undue stress and anxiety during journeys.

Our Solution

As a team, we created the Pawprints app for real-time pet monitoring during transit. It includes an in-flight screen app with live video feedback from a Bluetooth-enabled monitor in cargo and a companion mobile app for comprehensive location tracking from gate to gate.
Our goal is to boost transparency in pet treatment, giving owners peace of mind and holding transportation companies accountable for better conditions during transit.


How did we reach this ultimate resolution? Let's go back and review the process.

User Research

While operating within a college campus environment, our team enlisted interview participants from the student body at Cornell University who aligned with our target user group.

We conducted 5 interviews (dogs and cats owners) lasting 45 minutes each, covering travel habits and concerns about flying with pets. Participants shared recent experiences and demonstrated items used for pet transport.

We condensed interview data into insights using an affinity diagram, then crafted design requirements to address user group challenges.

Competitive Research

Existing solutions in the pet transportation domain lack focus on addressing the anxiety and potential harm arising from owners' lack of awareness throughout the process. Our analysis centers on products designed to monitor pets during separation, addressing the gaps in understanding pet emotions and well-being post check-in.

Most solutions involve applications enabling monitoring through photos and videos linked to a home-based device. Other products measure environmental or health metrics like air temperature, humidity, or body temperature. However, no existing products directly apply these features to the context of pet air travel.

The Idea

After a group vote on the aforementioned options, we opted for the following design concept to address our problem space.
Real-time in-flight app connected to a cargo Bluetooth monitor displays pet health and videos. Mobile app offers pre-flight status, location info, post-flight features, and a community for ratings and reviews.
Focused on a human-centered approach, we aim to ease pet owners' stress during travel by providing real-time updates. Empowering owners with monitoring evidence may encourage airlines to be more cautious, positively impacting pet treatment.

Information Architecture

Low-Fidelity Prototyping

Once we finalized the information architecture linking both apps in our design, each team member crafted their individual low-fidelity paper prototype to visualize the potential interaction flow for the desired functionalities.

High-Fidelity Prototyping

The Final Prototype

Our team showcased our app design at Cornell's 2022 Fall Information Science Showcase, where it was recognized as one of the most socially impactful ideas of the year. Our professor now uses this project as an exemplary model for future semesters of teaching!

My Team