Tech company Reactive Reality have just combined fashion and virtual reality to make a product that will transform the online shopping experience forever…
Reactive Reality is changing the customer experience when shopping for clothes online. Their state of the art virtual technology allows customers to virtually ‘try on’ clothes before making a purchase online.
Customers can capture their face to create an avatar, with the same facial features, hair and skin color as their own. Body measurements can then be added to customize the avatar further, allowing the customer to see exactly how e-commerce clothes will look like on them before they buy. The level of personalization their technology offers is transforming online retail, bringing an engaging customer experience to life at long last.
Online shopping may have started as a trend, but for many it’s become a preference. Since 2020, businesses have seen an increase from 16% to 19% in online orders. With online shopping’s growing popularity, it’s important fashion e-commerce brands make the most of new technologies in order to create a better online shopping experience for customers.
PICTOFiT is the official name of Reactive Reality’s technology. The interface allows online stores large and small to create unique, custom-tailored shopping experiences for their customers with the help of Virtual Reality (VR) and Artificial Intelligence (AI).
The way it works is relatively simple, yet mind-blowing. A real gape into the future of just how helpful technology can be to the user. Any e-commerce store that has PICTOFiT technology integrated onto their site will be able to help users to visualize garments on themselves (think virtual fitting room).
Users input simple information such as gender, height, weight and any additional measurements they have on hand. By adding just 6 body measurements, a visual accuracy of 94% can be achieved. The like-for-likeness is almost uncanny! Users can even take a selfie which will allow the avatar to replicate facial features and hair styles. Creating a full-blown replica of the user to dress and style as they see fit.
It’s a shopping experience unlike any other that will finally allow users to try clothes on in a state of virtual reality.
PICTOFiT provides businesses with a handful of opportunities to create a truly unique shopping experience for their customers.
PICTOFiT technology is able to generate 3D models of an e-commerce store’s products using their product imagery. The result is a more detailed image than traditional 2D photos and better visualisation of the products. With more details, these 3D renderings have been found to lead to more reliable purchases for customers. Reactive Reality’s software creates these images in a matter of minutes (whereas CAD software can take hours).
The AR where the avatars shop is also customizable. Businesses can change the background settings and create unique experiences for their customers. Store employees can also interact with shoppers within the AR environment to ensure a seamless and helpful shopping experience.
Additionally, businesses are saving money by processing less returns. Reactive Reality has found that PICTOFiT shoppers spend 6x more than shoppers utilizing traditional fashion e-commerce shopping experiences as a result… and it is also a key part of Reactive Reality’s mission to make shopping more sustainable.
Consumers have cited exceptional feedback about PICTOFiT technology.
Users are able to use their smartphone to create a custom avatar that stores their exact measurements. And, these measurements are even more reliable than tape measurements. With 3D renderings and accurate sizing, PICTOFiT, consumers have an easier time visualising themselves in the clothes they’re shopping for. Not only does this result in customers making more reliable purchases, they are actually satisfied with both the results and the shopping experience.
While it’s easy to see how an app like PICTOFiT is good for fashion brands and their customers, it’s also good for the planet.
Even before the pandemic, returns were a trillion-dollar problem for a handful of reasons.
We have all experienced the hassle of shopping online and being unsure on what size will fit. Rather than potentially ordering the wrong size, a common practice has become to order two or three different sizes. With returns being a relatively easy service form most brands, whichever sizes don’t fit gets sent back. This is innocent enough to get the correct size t-shirt, right?
But actually it’s a big pothole in the online shipping system.
While it may seem innocent, bulk orders like these create greater shipping carbon footprints due to their shipping weight. Roughly 17 billion items are sent back to businesses each year. Collectively, those returns create 4.7 million metric tons of CO2 annually.
With such huge expansion in online retail over the years, not a lot has been done to greenify the process. Now, PICTOFiT can provide users with a real life experience online, meaning no more deciphering size charts or playing a guessing game with chat bots. By getting real results in real time, return volumes have diminished rapidly reducing CO2 emissions.
Returns also create a false sense of supply and demand within the supply chain. Business’ often order more than what they need to accommodate people ordering products they never planned to keep. The returned sizes are sent back to warehouses to be examined, resorted, and reshelved. Many businesses find dealing with returns so overwhelming they will instead send returns straight to landfills. Accuracy provided from PICTOFiT technology will help businesses monitor these volumes early on rather than dealing with it at the final point of call within the supply process.
In 2018, returns alone accounted for 5 billion pounds of waste. This was before COVID- a time when online orders doubled for many online stores. But innovative tech, like Reactive Reality’s PICTOFiT, can mitigate these problems. Customers get the right size garment that they know looks good on them. Businesses can save money, and the fashion industry can reduce CO2 emissions drastically.
No one wants to lose the flexibility of a free return. In fact, it’s this guarantee that helps us feel more comfortable buying online. The stakes are lower. But, shoppers return 15% to 40% of what they buy online. 30% to 40% of those returns are shoes and clothing. Which is why adapting to AI and AR technologies is imperative if fashion ecommerce brands want to survive.
The issue isn’t actually the return, it’s getting the purchase right the first time.
In-life, personalized shopping experiences are the future of fashion and virtual reality. Most pleasingly, they make the shopping process more sustainable. Which is exactly why we at One Tribe are incredibly excited to be joining forces with the Reactive Reality team.
We know they’re building a more sustainable future for customers and business owners alike. And most importantly, they are innovating the ways that sustainability can work in a modern world. Like us, they share the same vision to protect the planet from damage, and are innovating new ways to take climate action.
If you’re a sustainable fashion brand ready to invest in the future of fashion, connect with Reactive Reality on how they can help your customers find the perfect fit and style for all the clothes you offer.
If you’re a fashion business who’s seeking new ways to offset your carbon footprint, we’re excited to be working alongside Reactive Reality to make that goal a reality.
Like Reactive Reality, One Tribe technology integrates with fashion e-commerce stores to protect trees and aid conservation projects in the Amazon Rainforest.
Together, we are offsetting brands’ carbon footprints and taking climate action!
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One Tribe is a Climate Action Platform enabling businesses and their customers to make a positive environmental impact.