Purrchase Pal

App Logo
Mobile Login Page
Adding a Purrchase
Feed Part 1
Feed Part 2
User Profile Page
Join or Create a Group Feature
Leaderboard page

Inspiration

Impulse spending is something almost every college student experiences. Whether it’s a late-night online purchase, a “limited time” deal, or something trending on social media, it’s easy to convince ourselves we need something in the moment. In reality, many of these decisions already involve friends. We text someone, ask “Should I buy this?”, and wait for their opinion. That moment of social accountability often helps us pause and reconsider. We realized there wasn’t a tool designed around that behavior. So we created Purrchase Pal, a social accountability system that turns impulse spending decisions into collaborative, gamified moments with friends. Instead of making purchases alone, users can pause, ask their group, and receive both AI insights and peer feedback before committing.

What It Does

(=^･ω･^=) Group Accountability Voting Users create friend groups where they can submit potential purchases before buying them. Friends vote on whether the purchase is worth it or not, helping users pause and reflect before spending.

(💸) AI Purchase Feedback with Gemini Gemini analyzes the purchase and gives contextual feedback about the spending decision. It can highlight potential regret signals and encourage users to reflect before committing.

How We Built It

The backend was developed using Python and MongoDB Atlas to efficiently manage databases and handle user data at scale. The frontend was built with React, Vite, and JavaScript, resulting in a responsive, intuitive interface that enables seamless user interaction with the platform. The Gemini API incorporates an unbiased AI model, selected for its reliability, adaptability, and support for customizable features. Supabase manages secure user authentication, while FastAPI serves as the bridge between the frontend and backend through well-structured API routes. For the visual design, Canva and Procreate were used to design the logo and establish a cohesive color palette, ensuring a consistent, polished user experience.

Challenges We Ran Into

One of our biggest challenges was coordinating development across multiple contributors with different levels of GitHub experience. Managing branches, avoiding merge conflicts, and syncing work without losing progress required a lot of communication and troubleshooting. Another challenge occurred when our Gemini API key was accidentally exposed publicly during development. Initially, revoking and replacing the key proved difficult. With guidance from mentors and documentation, we were able to delete the exposed key and properly secure our credentials to prevent future issues. These experiences forced us to quickly learn best practices for version control and API security in real-world development.

Accomplishments That We're Proud Of

In just 24 hours, we successfully built a fully functional prototype that combines social interaction, AI feedback, and gamification into a cohesive application. We’re especially proud of:

Building a working full-stack application from scratch
Integrating AI purchase analysis using Gemini
Creating a gamified accountability system with leaderboards and scoring
Designing a clean, friendly interface that makes financial responsibility feel engaging rather than restrictive Most importantly, we built something people around us immediately wanted to use.

What We Learned

This project taught us a huge amount about both technology and teamwork. Technically, we gained experience working across the entire full-stack development pipeline, including frontend development with React, backend APIs with FastAPI, database management with MongoDB, authentication with Supabase, and AI integration using Gemini. We also learned the importance of secure credential management and how to properly protect API keys during development. Most importantly, we learned how to rapidly turn an idea into a working product under tight time constraints.

What's Next For Purrchase Pal

We see strong potential for Purrchase Pal as a tool that helps people reach savings goals through social accountability. Future updates we would like to implement include:

(👥) Multiple Friend Groups **Allow users to join and participate in multiple groups instead of the current single-group limit. *(📱) Mobile App Deployment **Deploy Purrchase Pal as a downloadable mobile application for easier everyday use. *(🤖) Smarter AI Feedback **Improve Gemini integration so the AI can analyze long-term spending habits and provide personalized advice based on user behavior patterns. *(⚙️) More Customization **Allow groups to customize rules, point systems, and competition periods based on their goals.