Kwixx is a fairly unique product – it’s a bit like a ticketing app, except the thing you’re buying a ticket for is the chance to skip the queue. The idea is that businesses with busy queues – think cinemas, nightclubs, cafes and restaurants – sign up to Kwixx, and their customers can download the app in-store and buy a ticket that jumps them to the front of the line. It gives those businesses a way to offer a premium service rather than leaving money on the table when they’re flat out.
Kwixx is another project that came to me half-finished. The client, KCH Innovations, had originally engaged a design agency to build it, but the working relationship hadn’t worked out and they’d been unable to launch. I came in to rescue it – completing the remaining development and getting it over the line to launch. I also brought in and managed a third-party designer to help finish off the design on some new screens, working in Figma.
It’s a full product made up of a few parts: a marketing website in Next.js, a backend API in Ruby on Rails with MySQL, Stripe and Docker, a web frontend in React with Material UI, and a mobile app in React Native. The frontends and mobile app are all TypeScript, and the backend and frontend were hosted on AWS.
We did get it launched, but the timing was rough: COVID hit, and a business built around busy in-person queues suddenly didn’t make much sense. The client decided not to take it any further, and it’s been shut down since.