The days when you needed to physically go to your local department store to choose from the latest spring/summer collections are long gone. These days, fashion labels are blurring the lines between reality and technology. Whether it’s with innovative marketing campaigns or clever brand management, the industry has truly entered the 21st century.
British luxury label Burberry, for instance, opened their new flagship store on Regent Street in the heart of London’s shopping district late last year. Nothing extraordinary in that but there is something very different about this particular retail outlet. At first glance, it looks like the mirrors, video screens and clothes racks are just like those found everywhere else. But look a little harder and you’ll see that they hide a secret.
The company has called their new London store the most digitally-immersive and advanced store on the planet. And after just a few minutes of looking around, I could understand why.
Walk through the door and you’re instantly approached by a sales assistant, carrying a customised iPad and, on closer inspection, the mirrors and video screens aren’t quite as they seem.
In what is possibly a fashion first, radio frequency identification microchips –– RFIDs - are tagged on certain garments throughout the store. If you happen to try on something with one of these high-tech chips and then stand in front of one of what Burberry calls their ‘magic mirrors’, they transform into screens, showing you what accessories and colour combinations you might also want to complete your look. They are so clever, they’ll even show you how the particular piece of clothing you’re wearing is made. Forget mirrors that make you look slimmer or heavier, these will do a whole lot more.
The store has dozens of video screens and more than 500 speakers hidden throughout, as well as a seven metre high video screen, which Burberry say is the largest of its kind to be used so far in a fashion boutique.
It’s a bold step for the 156-year-old company, which has been busy transforming itself from stodgy British label into one of the most fashion-forward companies on the planet. While the store’s use of technology is extraordinary, Burberry is no stranger to new media. The company has used social media as an integral part of its long-term strategy for many years and, indeed, has been at the forefront of its use in fashion retail.
In its 2010 fashion week, Burberry partnered with Twitter to create Tweetwalk, an innovative concept that permitted fans of the brand see its latest outfits on the micro-blogging site before they actually hit the runway. Talk about fashion for the masses. Anna Wintour, watch out!
Phil Han is CNN International’s social media correspondent and producer, who can be seen on ‘Connect The World’, weekdays www.cnn.com/connect
