Keywords

1 Subject Research Background

1.1 Demand and Market for Milk Tea

As a beverage for entertainment and leisure consumption, milk tea is popular in the market, especially with young consumers, for its fashionable and fast characteristics. In 2000, there were less than 1,000 milk tea companies across the country, and it has grown to more than 140,000 now. People’s pursuit of milk tea has also been upgraded from the mainstream and fashion in restaurants and cafes to a composite experience of space, aesthetics, culture, and information exchange [1].

1.2 Consumption of Disposable Tableware of Milk Tea Products

The huge demand for milk tea brings about the consumption of a large number of disposable milk tea tableware, especially the consumption of milk tea cups. At present, the disposable plastic cups used in the market mainly include PE cup, PP cup and PET cup, while the more environmentally friendly milk tea shop will use paper cup. But in fact, the separation of the plastic coating and the paper cup, the removal of the ink and beverage residue on the paper cup, all bring great problems to the recycling of the paper cup. In addition, young people now drink milk tea more inclined to take out, resulting in a lot of milk tea cups cannot be found. Therefore, we will focus on the milk tea shops in Chinese universities and apply the sustainable product service system to it [2].

2 Research on the Status of the Existing Takeout Product Service System of Milk Tea Drinks

2.1 Product Service System

According to the general operating mode of the existing milk tea shop in the university, the following product service system diagram has been combed out [3].

Fig. 1.
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Product service system diagram

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Figure 1 clearly shows the relationship between various stakeholders, each link of the service, and the flow of material, capital, information and labor within it. Among them, the core stakeholders are milk tea shops, users and tableware producers.

2.2 Service Blueprint Based on User Journey Map

The service blueprint can clearly show the service process in the system, and visualize the emotions, satisfaction, expectations of users in each node of the service process, as well as the interaction of each component in the system [4]. We combined the user journey map and service blueprint to analyze the process of milk tea drinks industry providing services to consumers on university campuses.

Fig. 2.
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Online ordering mode

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Fig. 3.
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Offline ordering mode

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Figure 2 and Fig. 3 are the service blueprints of consumers under online and offline ordering modes respectively. Figure 2 mainly shows that the waiting time is too long, the packaging quality and appearance affect the experience sense, and the post-meal waste disposal is inconvenient. In Fig. 3, the queuing time is too long, the environment of the store needs to be improved, and the sealing, portability and pollution prevention of the packaging are not good enough.

Finally, we conducted a horizontal analysis of the service blueprint, and it was found that the waste mainly occurred in the dining stage and post dine stage. In the dining stage, customers were provided with disposable and non-recyclable tableware, whether they choose eat-in or take-out service, which leads to the consumption and waste of resources. In the post dine stage, the imperfect garbage sorting and recycling system and people’s weak awareness of environmental protection have brought greater challenges to sustainable development.

2.3 KANO Model

Overview of KANO Model.

Professor Noriaki Kano, from Tokyo University of Technology, established the KANO model for the first time in 1982, which can be used to analyze the impact of user demand on user satisfaction and present the relationship between user satisfaction and product quality. However, this model is only an auxiliary tool to study customer needs, providing theoretical guidance for product development and design, and cannot measure user satisfaction. It divides user requirements into five divisions, namely, basic needs, performance needs, attractions, indifference, and reverse needs [5] (Fig. 4).

Fig. 4.
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Five divisions in KANO’s model

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User Requirements Analysis Based on KANO Model.

Through literature review, observation, interview and summary of the service blueprint, we extracted the possible user needs and designed the questionnaire “Requirements of Milk Tea Drinks Consumption on Campus”. Refers to the classified comparison table of Kano evaluation results, the questionnaire sets forward and reverse questions for each user needs to measure the user’s response to the presence or absence of a quality feature [6]. We randomly distributed 350 questionnaires to different universities in China, and finally collected 317 valid questionnaires. In order to verify the credibility of the questionnaires, we divided all Chinese universities into three categories: technical university, undergraduate university and graduate university. Then, we randomly selected three samples from each university, and analyzed the information of the samples. As can be seen from Table 1, the sample distribution is relatively uniform, indicating that the questionnaires have a certain credibility (Tables 2, 3 and 4).

Table 1. AHP table
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Table 2. KANO evaluation result classification comparison table
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Table 3. Form of the questionnaire
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In 1996, Berger proposed the Better-Worse coefficient. Quantify the user needs and user satisfaction from the effective questionnaires through the Better-Worse calculation formula. Put each need into the Better-Worse tetragonal potential coefficient analysis chart for data analysis and classification according to the absolute value of the Better-Worse coefficient.

$${\text{Better}}/{\text{SI}} = \left( {{\text{A}} + {\text{O}}} \right)/\left( {{\text{A}} + {\text{O}} + {\text{M}} + {\text{I}}} \right)$$
(1)
$${\text{Worse}}/{\text{DSI}} = - 1*\left( {{\text{O}} + {\text{M}}} \right)/\left( {{\text{A}} + {\text{O}} + {\text{M}} + {\text{I}}} \right)$$
(2)

SI indicates the degree of user satisfaction when the requirement is met, and its value is usually positive. The closer it is to 1, the greater the impact on user satisfaction will be. | DSI | indicates the degree of dissatisfaction of the user when the requirement is not met, its value is negative, usually the closer to 1, the greater the influence on user dissatisfaction. SI > 0.5&DSI > 0.5 is Performance needs; SI > 0.5&DSI < 0.5 is Attractions; SI < 0.5&DSI < 0.5 is Indifference; SI < 0.5&DSI > 0.5 is Basic needs [7].

In product optimization, the priority order of similar requirements is generally Basic needs > Performance needs > Attractions > Indifference. For similar requirements, the higher the SI, the higher the priority. Therefore, the overall priority order of user needs in the takeout product service system of milk tea drinks in Chinese university campus is: A1 > A6 > A8 > A14 > A13 > A7 > A12 > A15 > A4 > A5 > A10 > A3 > A16 > A9 > A11 > A2. We should ensure that Basic needs are met, Performance needs are satisfied as far as possible and appropriately meet the Attractions according to the business situation of the milk tea shop (Fig. 5).

Table 4. Analysis and category of user requirements
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Fig. 5.
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Better-worse tetragonal potential coefficient analysis chart

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3 Design Concepts About Sustainability

3.1 Sustainable Development Theory

In 2007, Munasinghe put forward the theory of “Sustainable Development Triangle” [8], which understands Sustainable Development from three dimensions: economy, environment and society. At the economic level, sustainable development implies a strong resilience of the economic system. On the environmental level, emphasis is placed on maintaining the resilience of the ecosystem. At the social level, ethics and fairness should be emphasized to enhance the vitality of social and cultural systems.

3.2 Sustainable Development Applications

Traditional products mostly focus on the function, appearance and durability of the product, but the requirements of sustainable development of the product will pay more attention to energy consumption, impact on the environment and the end-of-product life cycle management [9]. The key to applying sustainable development to the system is to clarify the interaction between various stakeholders in the system and transform the products sold into sales experience and make users and enterprises reach a consensus and tend to sustainable development consciously.

According to the system diagram analyzed above, we try to nest the interests of each member into the service process to make their behavior more sustainable.

3.3 Sustainable Design Concepts

Based on the above analyses, we decided to use reusable cups made of wheat straw and straw made of disposable degradable straw, and proposed three design concepts (Fig. 6):

Fig. 6.
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System diagram of concept A, B and C

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  1. a.

    Milk tea shop staff or volunteers to clean recycled tableware.

  2. b.

    Set up automatic cleaning machines. The staff only needs to go to the cleaning machines regularly to retrieve the tableware to the store.

  3. c.

    After drinking, the user cleans the cup and places it at the nearby recycling point. Each user must place a clean cup in it to get a new one. Users who bring cups to the shop can enjoy a discount.

The system diagrams of concept A and B are structurally similar. However, the automatic cleaning machine in concept B requires the investment of the milk tea shop, which is not economical. Concept C encourages users to recycle tableware through store preferential treatment, and then makes up for the reduced profit of it with reducing tableware consumption, so as to balance the interests of merchants and consumers. In conclusion, concept C seems more in line with the requirements of sustainability.

4 Design Practice

4.1 Determination of the Concept of the Beverage Cup

Fig. 7.
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Final design of the cup

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The final design of the cup is determined according to the previous researches. Its shape and color are for reference only. The cup is made of insulated straw material that meets A8, A13, A10 and A15. The cups are designed in two sizes. Users can choose different sizes of cups according to their own needs, which meets A11. The small cup capacity is 350ml, the maximum diameter is 80 mm, the minimum diameter is 60 mm; The large cup has a capacity of 500 ml, with a maximum diameter of 90 mm and a minimum diameter of 55 mm. Suitable for most adults with one hand grip, meets A14. The top cover of the cup is opened in an upward way, which is convenient for users to drink milk tea while walking. After drinking, the top cover can be closed to prevent air pollution. They meet the requirements of A6, A5 and A12. Sliders on the cover provide a customized service for temperature and sweetness, meets A16 (Fig. 7).

4.2 Service Process Design Practice

To comply with the development of the data era and the trend of online operation, we will implant WeChat applet into the product service system. It will serve as a tool for verifying the identity in the process of ordering food and recycling to provide users with more convenient services. In the process of ordering meals, the applet provides functions such as selecting commodities, online payment, displaying the waiting time, reminding to take meals, etc. In the process of recycling, users can take and place the cups by identifying the QR code on the machine to complete identity verification. The user who chooses “Bring my own tableware” in the applet can get the discount.

5 Summary and Prospect

In this paper, system diagram, service blueprint, Kano model and other tools are used to study the sustainability and optimal design the takeout product service system of milk tea drinks in Chinese university campus. The final design meets the requirements of sustainable development from three dimensions: economic, social and environmental. On the economic level, the recycling of milk tea cups reduces the cost of milk tea products, increases the profit of milk tea shops and reduces consumer spending. On a social level, the design of milk tea cup makes it easier for the clerks to work. The customer’s involvement in the recycling process raises awareness of sustainability and eases the work of the shop assistants. At the environmental level, giving up the use of disposable and non-recyclable tableware reduces the consumption and waste of resources and eases the environmental burden. By adjusting the interaction of the participants in the system, the design can arouse their enthusiasm to participate in environmental protection and provide a new idea for building a virtuous cycle of sustainable system. However, the application scope of this system is limited to the campus. If it is to be applied to the whole society, the sharing of drinks and cups can be achieved by referring to the form of shared bikes.