How's California been doing? We conducted an intercept interview in one of the most popular places in San Francisco, Westfield shopping mall, to ask for people's opinions.

Out of ten people that we interviewed, two people think that we're still in a drought. So what is the real situation?

The figure below tells that over the years the drought seasons in California are becoming significantly longer and more extreme.

To find out the cause of the severe drought, we need to look at how the state municipalities deal with water.

We made a concept map to trace through how the water is collected, transferred, and used in California.

Knowing the types of water use is good, but how are we as individuals actually using the water? After looking at the water flow from the higher level, we went on to investigate where do people used the most water on and which types of water use it belongs to.

Nine out of ten people believe they used the most water in shower, while the other person thinks it's drinking. (......) We did secondary research further and explored the virtual water trade between the individuals and the related subjects in an ecosystem map.

It is very surprising to us that so many parts of our life need water, even including building the city infrastructure. The products that we consume everyday has a hidden water footprint and are involved with virtual water trades.

Another thing worth noticing is how multi-dimensional our water usage could be on a single type of product. Take clothes for example, we are aware that the they went through the production line in the factories but are less aware of the fact that they were made of cotton, which was grown on the agricultural lands.

It was obviously an overwhelming number: 80% of water goes to agriculture. In our expert interview with Dr. Christine Metzger, she stressed the importance to fix the part of the most significant portion in the system and suggested us to pursue on this aspect further.

During our research, we found out that an astonishing amount of water is used for animal agricultural purposes. Not only is it water-consuming, it's also consumptive use – which means that the water cannot be recycled and reused.

But do people realize the usage of water in the animal production process? In our intercept interview, everybody's response was:

So how did we end up using so much water? We took a look at the amount of water being used to produce 1.75 ounces (50g) of chicken, pork, and beef.

If we measure it using the one-gallon bottle, this is how much water used to produce 1.75 ounces (50g) of chicken:

For pork, it's like this much.

When Nathalia and I were screaming "no pork any longer", we saw the data of beef......

And these are the results displayed in numbers.

We're not aware of how much water are used to produce meat, because although we all know that beef is produced from cows......

We forget what's before cows.

The grass, corn, and soybeans are main food resources for cows. The corns and soybeans are especially popular as inexpensive choices. All of these plants are very water-intensive to produce and made the water footprint of meat so high.

We're expected to reach an all-time high meat consumption rate in the United States in 2018.

We need to make an impact through changing either the system or the behavior. In this case, reducing meat consumption is an appropriate way to influence the industry with no institutional change required, at least for now.

Beef is the most water-intensive meat and we decided to set a realistic goal so that we could influence a reasonable amount of people first. We made the goal for the project: Reduce or adjust beef consumption.

We think Whole Foods would be a great participant to collaborate with us considering that our objectives align with Whole Foods' mission. Moreover, Whole Foods has a close relationship with its food sources such as factories and farms, which would allow us to make significantly more impactful design solutions.

If we examine the product flow and how customers consume meat by purchasing items in Whole Foods, we can see how the virtual water flows from the farm, to the factory, to the market place, which is Whole Foods, and to the customer. If we're able to make the information of water used more transparent and accessible to the customers, they could make an impact and influence the industrial chain backwards.

To design for specific audiences, we determined two distinctively different kinds of customers in Whole Foods.

The first kind of customers knows what to buy. They have an existing purchase goal. If we align them with the Awareness-Acceptance-Action framework, it's more difficult to make them take unexpected actions, but awareness and acceptance could be achievable.

The second kind of customers are not sure what to buy. They are here to explore the market. It would be easier to influence their purchase decisions.

We mapped out their journey to purchase a meat-related product in Whole Foods and looked for opportunities.

Based on the journey map, we brainstormed and created several design provocations that reflect different stages and align with the Awareness-Acceptance-Action framework.

When customers walk into the Whole Foods store, they would see the posters explaining general information of the water usage in meat production, raising the awareness of the issue effectively.

As customers approach the meat stock, they would see the water intensity signages on the floor.

Usually, the meat in Whole Foods are organized by animal sources. Since the water usage of meat production is drastically different by animal types, it is convenient to mark the difference and re-order the products on the spectrum from least to most water intensive.

Water cost labels inform the the total water usage and water-efficiency of the products, which include not only raw or processed meat, but also vegetables, fruits, and any processed product by Whole Foods that h these food sources.

Take a conceptual product for example: Whole Foods just imported Corella Beef Strip Loin, a more water-efficient beef product.

Thanks to the relationship with the farms and factories, Whole Foods would be able collect these data:

1. Water used to produce a pack of Corella Beef Strip Loin
2. Water used to produce 1000 calories of Corella Beef Strip Loin

The first data reflects the total water usage. The second data is calculated based on the first one to determine the efficiency of water usage.

If we create a spectrum and put products on it based on the ranking of the second data, it would probably look like this:

Based on where products sit, we developed a water efficiency rating system similar to Whole Foods' meat rating system.

The total water usage and water efficiency rating will be labeled directly on the products.

We can also alter the text to encourage comparisons between products and wiser purchase decisions.

The water cost labels reflect our main goal of the project: making information transparent and accessible. They allow customers to compare the water-efficiency of different products, quantify the water usage in numbers that they could understand, and realize the potential in themselves to make an impact.

Documentation in progress. To be continued.

Documentation in progress. To be continued.

Documentation in progress. To be continued.