MART2U

An institution that takes donations, sells goods and manages membership usually runs all three in separate systems — or in none. Money arrives through three channels and no single place shows the full picture.

MART2U was built as a prototype to test one idea: can buying, donating and institution management sit in one flow without becoming awkward?

As a prototype the goal was to answer a design question quickly, not to ship a finished product.

The most useful finding: donations and purchases look alike in code and are very different to the user. Someone donating wants to know where the money goes; someone buying wants to know when the goods arrive. Merging those flows saves code and confuses people — and that is a useful answer to get at prototype stage rather than after launch.