iFood

About the company

iFood is the biggest food delivery service in Latin America and an unquestionable global giant in the industry, right up there with DoorDash, Deliveroo, and others. Backed by relevant global VCs and companies, such as Innova Capital and Just Eat, it is currently worth, as of the latest round, USD 5.4 billion. By the time I left, the company had about 5k+ employees, with the design team being around 40+.

My journey there

I joined right after the Logistics team was created. We were responsible for creating and maturing the newly developed driver product. At that point, iFood used to partner with several third-party delivery companies to offer the actual delivery service to restaurants. However, despite of that, most restaurants ended up using their own contractors, thus using iFood only as the storefront. Changing this scenario was the challenge. The driver app and the Logistics team was the missing piece to offer an end-to-end product to restaurants.

It was a special moment, as the team was just starting to take shape. We used to joke that being on the Logistics team was like being in a startup inside another startup. Given iFood was already a considerably mature startup, our team essentially didn't have to worry about the financials of the logistics operation (at least at first), so we could instead focus 100% on making the best product. But we needed to pull that off very, very fast, which meant we had to be super scrappy and bold.

The entire Logistics team worked from this tiny, messy, and cozy office.

As the team's first designer, I learned more than I could've ever hoped for—it speaks to the advantages of a very cross-functional team. The whole Logistics product team consisted of a tiny group of 3, maybe 4, engineers in charge of setting up all the core APIs and infrastructure. There was definitely a lot to do and figure out.

Cases deep dive

Here are some of the highlights from my time in the team:

Shipping the driver app v1

We had to lift this app from the ground up, creating the foundations for hyper-growth and an operationally viable business.

Revamping the onboarding flow

As with any newly released product, onboarding is a structural piece of the user flow. After shipping the app’s first version, we tucked in to properly design this.

Designing the earning management experience

For a driver, managing earnings and expenses is a daily action—a critical moment in their journey to making a living through the app.

Closing thoughts

iFood was a pivotal moment in my career. Being a solo designer in such a demanding moment put me to the test multiple times, but I'm glad I went through it all together with that team in particular. After many stressful projects and bumps in the road, we ultimately ended up becoming one of the most well-oiled teams in the company, and fundamentally enabled the Logistics unit's growth—especially at a moment when iFood had just received its biggest round of funding, which had a significant portion directed toward our org.

I'm happy to know that much of my work was useful to the future designers and PMs who continued working on the product. A lot has changed since I left, which is how things go, but I'm always stoked to have participated in setting up the structure on which the company stands today. The Driver App, in particular, is probably one of the most widely-used of its kind in the entire world (surely the most used in LATAM, at least).

Google Play back then. The logo I designed is still there, though!