How to brighten up your customer's shopping experience

Finding great looking clothes can be hard enough, but there's nothing worse than buying an outfit that looks great in the store--only to find that it looks horrible in natural light.

Today, I just read about one company that has made shopping a better experience in their store. 

Josh at www.grokdotcom.com wrote that the last time he was at American clothing store J. Crew, he noticed a "Daytime" & "Nighttime" switch in the changing room. 

Flipping it changed the brilliance of the overhead lighting so shoppers could see how their clothing will look at different times of the day.

What a great idea!  Giving customers a chance to see their clothing in multiple ways before they leave the store.

Result 1: Happier customers who get clothing that they know looks good on them in all lighting.

Result 2: Fewer returns--the plague of every retailer--for J. Crew and the added bonus of showing their customers that they care.

Sounds like a simple way to enhance the customer experience.  Kudos to J. Crew for thinking of it.

Comments

[Asgeir Hoem]

Katie,

The solution you mention is great. I remember once buying a jacket that was almost -glowing- when I tried it in daylight.

What about online shopping? Often, all you see is the item laying on a white background and some measurements. As online shopping grows, there will be a need for some way to know that the items will fit as expected.

Could a standard size range be agreed upon? What about some 3D model representation of yourself on which a chosen item can 'put on'?

https://www.cicatriz.se/ has got a pretty clever solution, where video is used to show of the items as they are worn. This could be taken further, and video clips could be shot in different situations, environments and light settings.

Any thoughts on this?

Yes, those are some pretty good ideas. I like how you've expanded on the concept and come up with some ways that companies can help their online customers get the right fit. It might be a difficult thing to implement at first, but I think online clothing companies would appreciate the resulting savings on returned inventory and restocking costs.

I'm a little unsure of the online 3D model--I'm very wary of buying clothing untested--but I'd the last to say an idea should be abandoned because of one initial bad reaction. I think a lot of other people would appreciate the convenience. ~Katie