Inspiration
College students often have tight budgets yet need to make costly purchases for items they only need short term. This includes apartment furniture, textbooks, technology, professional attire, parking, etc. Heel Deals is a verified resale platform that allows UNC students to resell their no longer needed college goods to other students at a reduced price. This promotes accessibility for these items, aids with budgeting, and promotes sustainability through reduced waste of these items. While resale markets already exists, a smaller scale version specific to UNC provides a level of trust and community that is not found elsewhere, and eliminates the need to rely on shipping and handling which is costly, unreliable, and slow. It also allows for additional functionalities such as storage for items.
What it does
Heel Deals is a web application that allows UNC students to buy and sell from one another.
How we built it
We did our frontend with Angular in TypeScript and our backend in Python with FastAPI
Challenges we ran into
We had difficulties when attempting to connect the frontend to the backend. It took a lot of trial and error and guidance from mentors, but ultimately we ran out of time on that part.
Accomplishments that we're proud of
We are proud of not bailing even though our project is not 100% complete. We stayed up all night and gave it out best. We learned a lot about web development and collaboration along the way!
What we learned
This is our very first personal project we have worked on not for a class. We learned a lot about both frontend and backend web development, using frameworks, along with how to collaborate and code with others. We learned how to do data storage and retrieval and also how to take advantage of open source resources.
What's next for Heel Deals
Fist off we need to connect our frontend to out backend. In terms of the concept of "Heel Deals," a future functionality could be a storage option. For graduating students, they may be moving and not be able to sell and transport items immediately. They could list their items on Heel Deals and opt to store it in a Heel Deal owned location. Sellers who opt into Heel Deal storage must agree to the condition that if the item doesn't sell after a specified amount of time, it could be donated to a second hand store. This also expends our mission of sustainability through encouraging second-hand use!
Log in or sign up for Devpost to join the conversation.