The key points
- According to 20% of respondents, they are a motivation for shopping on reselling platforms
- 42% of Italians bought something second hand
- Size errors account for over two-fifths (43%) of clothing returns purchased online
Buy less and buy the right clothes, identifying the correct size thanks to artificial intelligence. And then put the less used clothes and accessories back into circulation – so as to give them a new life, in the wardrobe of new owners – perhaps by buying other second-hand garments. All with a view to avoiding overproduction and waste, reducing the environmental impact. This will be the shopping of the future, outlined in the study entitled “The future of shopping” commissioned by Snapchat and conducted by Foresight Factory in twelve countries, including Italy.
The social media, which has an audience of very young people and collaborates with fashion companies of the caliber of Prada and Dior, wanted to investigate how shopping habits have changed during the pandemic and what are the expectations and desires of consumers. The priority, for young and very young people, is the environment: two out of five Italian consumers (43%) are concerned about the environmental impact of online purchases, since it reaches 50% among Gen Z and 46% among Millennials .
Reselling and second hand are popular
Environmental reasons, according to 20% of respondents, are a motivation for shopping on reselling platforms. Which in Italy are used more and more: among Italian consumers one in four regularly looks for second-hand options; 42% bought something through a reselling platform, a percentage that reaches 53% among Millennials. Beyond the consequences of purchases on the environment, the reasons that push to buy on reselling platforms are convenience (54%), followed by the possibility of finding products that have been sold out elsewhere (33%) and the search for unique pieces. (30%).
Augmented reality to try on garments and avoid waste
If the purchase and sale of second hand products will therefore be a shopping frontier of the future, augmented reality applied to try-on tools could contribute to reducing the environmental impact of purchases (which, therefore, allows you to virtually try the product) which, it is estimated, could have avoided 37% of the returns of clothing purchased online in the last year. Size errors, in fact, account for over two-fifths (43%) of returns of clothing purchased online in the last year in Italy. Try-on technologies also respond to a customer need: the inability to try products before buying them represents a critical issue for 42% of respondents. In particular, Italian consumers would use augmented reality to see how the products would look (37%), see them at 360 ° (34%) and understand their exact size (34%).