Inspiration
Living in shared spaces—hostels, flats, student housing—we kept noticing the same painful loop: everyone knows they need groceries, yet everyone makes their own lonely trip.
Two people living 10 feet apart would walk 30 minutes each… for the same carton of milk.
Someone else messages a group chat begging, “Bro if you're going can you buy Maggi?” but the message gets buried under 80 unread texts.
It felt wasteful, uncoordinated, and honestly—stupid.
We wanted to eliminate this chaos.
We wanted to turn random, inefficient grocery runs into a coordinated, shared system.
That’s how GrocerMate was born.
What it does
GrocerMate centralizes grocery needs for any group living together.
- A single synced grocery list shared across the group
- Anyone going to the store can instantly see what others need
- After buying, they upload a photo of the bill
- The app automatically calculates who owes what
- Transparent, fair cost-splitting with zero manual tracking
No messy chats.
No lost receipts.
No awkward “can you please send $4.67” conversations.
Just… clarity.
How we built it
We started by mapping out every pain point students face during grocery runs. Once the flows were clear, we built:
- A clean React Native (Expo 54) frontend for mobile + web
- A PostgreSQL backend to manage lists, costs, and settlements
- Real-time syncing across all users
- An automated settlement engine that parses bills and assigns costs with zero manual input
Challenges we ran into
- Syncing shared lists across many users without inconsistencies
- Designing a settlement flow that felt intuitive yet powerful
- Debugging backend connections—containerization, web deployment, Postgres links
- Handling tricky cases: partial purchases, cancelled trips, mixed contributions
Accomplishments we're proud of
- Built a fully functional cross-platform app within a hackathon timeframe
- Created a settlement system that works surprisingly smoothly
- Designed a UI simple enough for even the most sleep-deprived hostel student
- Reduced grocery runs from multiple daily trips to a single coordinated one
Most importantly:
We turned a daily frustration into a clean, elegant solution.
What we learned
- Backend consistency matters more than expected
- Group-based apps introduce complexity far beyond single-user workflows
What's next for GrocerMate
We want to expand GrocerMate with:
- Automated OCR bill scanning
- Smart purchase recommendations
- Carbon footprint savings tracking
- Low-stock reminders and automation
GrocerMate started as a hackathon idea.
But it feels like something we—and thousands of students—would genuinely use every week.
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