Visit DropQ

DropQ

Queue the hype.

Product
DropQ
Discipline
Product, design & build
Role
Founder, Product design & build
Platform
Web, Mobile-first
Sectors
Food, Collectibles, Apparel, Art
Responsibilities
Product strategy, UX, IA, UI, front-end
The DropQ storefront on a laptop and a phone, headed Organized Drops. Happy Customers., with buttons to start selling and to see a live store
The same storefront on a desktop and in a hand.
Problem
Independent sellers run limited drops across a form, a payment app, a spreadsheet and a group text. The stack holds until a drop goes viral, then it fails at the worst possible moment.
My role
Founder. Product strategy, UX, information architecture and UI, and the front-end build. I designed and built the app, working with AI through the development.
Key decisions
Make inventory that cannot oversell the centre of the product rather than a setting, give the seller a customer list they own, and add a messaging stream once the first real drop showed vendors and customers had nowhere to talk.
Result
A live platform with seven vendors selling on it, taken from problem to production by one person.
  • 7vendors live on the platform
  • End to endstrategy, design and front-end
  • Shippedtimed drops, inventory, messaging

Overview

Independent sellers run limited drops on a stack of apps that do not talk to each other: a form for orders, a payment app, a spreadsheet, a group text. DropQ replaces that with timed releases, inventory that cannot oversell, and a customer list the seller actually owns.

The problem

Your business runs on a dozen apps that don’t talk to each other.

Instagram for marketing. A link in bio for the catalogue. A spreadsheet for orders. A payment app. A group text for the waitlist. It works until a drop goes viral, and then it fails at the worst possible moment.

A market seller checking her phone mid-sale, with three failure modes called out over the scene: overselling and refunds, crashed links, and customers you lose
What was difficult. The stack sellers had assembled worked most of the time, so the failure only showed up on the best day of the month. What we decided. Design for the viral drop rather than the ordinary one. Why it mattered. Overselling, a crashed link and a lost customer list are the three moments that cost a seller their reputation.

The Opportunity

We set out to help cottage food vendors sell their goods, grow a following, and build a community with fellow vendors and customers.

The four steps, each a card linked by an arrow: set up your store, store ready; build a drop, drop scheduled; share one link, customers notified; fulfil and get paid, order complete
What was difficult. A seller setting up for the first time has no patience for configuration. What we decided. Reduce the whole product to four steps, each with a visible end state. Why it mattered. It let someone set up a store and run a drop without being taught the software first.

What We Learned

Our first drop worked, but it revealed a need for better communication between vendors and customers. We added a messaging stream so vendors could stay connected with customers and track every sale and new customer in one place.

The Direction

I designed and built the entire app with AI, using ChatGPT and Claude in VS Code. Screens I created in Figma guided the visual direction, while detailed, iterative conversations helped strengthen the backend. The project showed me how much AI can amplify a designer’s judgment, craft, and ability to bring an idea to life.

A Figma board of DropQ dashboard and storefront screens, laid out in two frames
What was difficult. One person designing and building a product cannot afford a long handoff between the two. What we decided. Design in Figma for direction, then build the front-end directly with AI as the pair. Why it mattered. It collapsed the gap between a screen and a working build, which is why it shipped at all.

Designing the Experience

We refined the app through real-world testing: purchasing from multiple drops and speaking with vendors afterward. Those insights helped us simplify the buying journey and improve how vendors manage sales and communicate with customers.

The Visual System

My partner brings a traditional graphic design background, and I gave him creative freedom to shape the color palette, typography, and logo.

The DropQ brand board: the wordmark and its tag icon, colour swatches, and the mark reversed for social

The Final Experience

DropQ is live with seven vendors, and our go-to-market plan targets 100 by the end of 2026. Next, we’re launching in-person meetups to build community and grow participation among vendors and customers.

The Impact

We built DropQ for an underserved market, with growing enthusiasm from San Diego’s pop-up community. That early interest is helping shape the platform as we work toward broader adoption.

The Takeaway

Vendors are launching spontaneous drops on their own, an encouraging sign that the experience is easy to use.

What I led

  • Product strategy. Chose which parts of a seller’s improvised stack the product would replace, and which it would leave alone.
  • Experience and IA. Designed the buying journey and the seller’s dashboard, then simplified both against what real drops exposed.
  • UI and visual direction. Designed the screens in Figma and set the direction; my partner, who comes from a traditional graphic design background, shaped the palette, typography and logo with creative freedom.
  • Front-end build. Wrote the application front-end, using ChatGPT and Claude in VS Code, with iterative work on the backend alongside it.
  • Validation. Bought from multiple drops and debriefed vendors afterwards, and fed what that exposed back into the product.

Shipped, and planned

DropQ is live. These are the parts that exist today, and the parts that do not yet.

  • Shipped. Timed drops, inventory that cannot oversell, an owned customer list, a vendor-to-customer messaging stream, the seller storefront, and DropMeet, the directory of local markets and pop-ups.
  • Planned. In-person vendor meetups, and a go-to-market target of 100 vendors by the end of 2026. Seven vendors are live today.
The category page: whatever you sell, drop it on DropQ, with cards for food and beverage, collectibles, and apparel and merch
DropMeet, a map of San Diego markets and pop-ups beside a list of places and times
Six phones showing DropQ: category browsing, a market listing, the DropMeet map, and the seller storefront

Next project

NIPR

A licensing task that could mean fourteen open windows, rebuilt as one guided sequence.