Retail 4.0 – Digital Customer and Retailer Feedback to Garment Development

Digital technologies open new possibilities ranging from integrated virtual product development to the direct involvement of customers and retailers through apps and collaborative virtual reality (VR) or augmented reality (AR) solutions. This requires end-to-end, flexible and modular solutions, especially in the retail environment.

In the Retail 4.0 research project, modular scalable software solutions were developed that enable the prompt transfer of feedback from retailers on garment development to the manufacturer. Thus, customers are directly involved on the basis of a new, digital VR/AR shopping experience. For example, the real shopping environment at the point of sale is additionally extended by a virtual solution to visualize garments on avatars via AR. In the B2B sector, clothing retailers and manufacturers exchange information about prototypes and future collections in a virtual showroom with the help of VR glasses.

Keywords: Digitalization; Fashion industry; Retailing; Collection development process; Virtual reality; Augmented reality; Virtual product development; Point-of-sale; Shopping experience; Fit

Keywords: VR = Virtual Reality; AR = Augmented Reality; POS = Point-of-Sale; SME = Small and Medium sized Enterprises; B2C = Business-to- Consumer; B2B = Business-to-Business; DITF = Deutsche Institute für Textil- und Faserforschung (German Institutes for Textile and Fiber Research Denkendorf); R&D = Research and Development