A powerful app for drivers

In 2018, I was part of the founding team responsible for building a new platform that enabled crowdsourced drivers to pick up grocery orders from Walmart stores and deliver them directly to customers.

As demand for home delivery surged, traditional last-mile logistics models became increasingly expensive and difficult to scale sustainably. Our challenge was to expand the delivery network without increasing costs for customers. The vision was simple but ambitious:

“Build the largest, most trusted, and cost-effective on-demand last-mile delivery network in the United States.”

A welcome video created for the drivers.

Once a customer places an order, two applications must operate in tight coordination.

Spark Driver - A mobile app used by drivers
Spark Dispatcher - A desktop app used by the call center agents, store associates, and operations team.

Let's Spark it up

The goal was to create a design language that felt fresh, energetic, and unmistakably aligned with Walmart’s brand.

Design System and Craft

Spark’s design language evolved continuously as the platform scaled.

We grounded the system in Walmart’s brand foundations, while defining clear standards for typography, iconography, and illustration. Rubik was chosen for its clarity and friendliness, and we designed over 100 custom icons to support expanding use cases.

Two-tone iconography was used for key screen takeovers, while playful, toy-like illustrations added moments of delight—helping humanize what is often a high-pressure, operational experience.

Collaboration & Research

We began work on Spark with an aggressive launch target of July 2018. Meeting this deadline required close collaboration across Development, Product, Business, Operations, and Legal teams.

In parallel, we partnered with AnswerLab to conduct multiple research studies with drivers from different gig-economy platforms. These insights directly shaped onboarding flows, task clarity, and trust signals ensuring the experience worked for drivers with varying levels of technical familiarity.

🚀 Launch

Launches are exciting and equally stressful.

A few days before launch, we traveled to Nashville to dogfood the app and complete real deliveries ourselves. This hands-on testing surfaced critical issues that we worked through in real time with the development team.

On July 10, 2018, Spark officially launched, marking Walmart’s first live deliveries powered entirely by the Spark Driver app.

We launched a broad set of features and addressed several critical issues in rapid succession. Spark quickly became one of the most talked-about products within Walmart and received multiple internal awards. The biggest sense of accomplishment was when we received a note from Greg Foran, who went on a surprise field visit and delivered a couple of orders by himself.

Pandemic 2020

In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic fundamentally changed the scale and expectations of delivery. Spark drivers became frontline workers overnight, and we evolved the platform with deep respect for their safety and role. The outpouring of appreciation from customers reinforced how essential these drivers had become during a critical time.

We built a platform for the drivers who were the frontline workers. We saw a lot of love being showered by our customers who truly valued the efforts that the drivers are putting in.

Expanding the Spark ecosystem

Since its initial launch, Spark has grown into a global platform by expanding to new countries and enabling drivers to earn in multiple ways. I collaborated with a broader design organization, contributing to platform reviews and helping shape a more cohesive and scalable ecosystem across multiple Spark initiatives.

In August 2021, Walmart announced a new delivery service business called Walmart GoLocal, which allows other merchants to tap into Walmart’s delivery platform to get orders to their customers. Spark Driver app will now play a central role in delivering orders from external clients to their customers as well.

Spark Shopper is a crowdsourced platform that enables drivers to shop for and deliver Walmart groceries to customers.

View Project

Task as a Service is a platform that allows core Spark drivers to have more options to earn money doing gig work.

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