Café-Flo

Period care. One cup of coffee at a time.

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💡Inspiration

"Wait... what even is the luteal phase?" our team asked each other, barely an hour into our first meeting. You would think that for young women, all who use period apps, would know the answer. But the truth is, most of us don't, and we are not alone. In Canada, 45% of teenage girls reported that they didn't fully understand their own menstrual cycles, even though it impacts our daily lives.

Currently, most existing period apps are designed for older users, filled with forums, articles and features that can feel overwhelming or too mature for younger audiences. As a result, teens often use these apps just to track their dates, and miss out on a meaningful educational resource.

Hence why we created Café-Flo, a period app that makes tracking engaging, empowering and educational for both teens and young adults. With gamified features, age-appropriate resources and personalized guidance with a trained RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation) AI-chat bot, Café-Flo bridges the gap from traditional platforms and helps younger users to better understand themselves through an interactive experience.

🤔What it does

  • Turns period tracking into a gamified educational experience for teens and young adults, allowing them to keep track of their phases while learning about their body
  • User completes daily tasks tied to their cycle phase, filling their virtual cups that can be added to a personal café collection menu, making their self-care interactive and rewarding
  • Ask our RAG AI-Chat bot "Periodista", an inner big sister that answers questions, gives advice and supports our younger women users
  • In the Friends tab, users are able to share their moods, cravings and updates, creating a supportive social space where cycle awareness is shared, empowering their experiences
  • The information tab provides users with articles made specifically for the younger generation, which educate them on important matters (e.g sustainable menstrual products, first-time experiences, period problems around the world, etc.)

🛠️How we built it

By integrating Gemini's API key via Vercel, we created "Periodista" a customized RAG AI-bot that helps teens and young women navigate and understand their health. The app was built using Node.js, TypeScript and React.

💪 Challenges we ran into

One of our biggest challenges was connecting Gemini's API through Vercel, as it took time to customize our RAG AI-Bot using specific data from reputable women's health sources. We had to experiment repeatedly through tokens, temperatures and p-values before it finally worked!

⭐ Accomplishments that we're proud of

Honestly, our team is genuinely proud of the whole project! From the first day when we had no clue what to do, to the next day when an old question sparked up a solid idea that we powered through all day and night (with plenty of snack breaks) to build an application that can educate young women all around the world.

📖 What we learned

We learnt to never give up... especially when it comes to learning how to implement API keys within a mobile app. Along with that, the importance of the MLH git commands sticker helped us all remember our git commands!

☕What's next for Café-Flo

We’re excited to grow Café-Flo beyond tracking and self-care. Next steps include expanding our gamified features and partnering with coffee/drink brands, so users can unlock discounts or special offers after collecting a certain number of cups in the app. Part of the profits from these partnerships could also be donated to causes like period poverty or menstrual health initiatives, letting users make a real-world impact while engaging with the app.

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