I was in a clothing store the other day and when I visited the trial rooms, I discovered some interesting interactions.
The moment I entered, the light in the fitting room changed and I noticed three buttons right next to the mirror and one of them was lit. The label on this “active” button was “Candle” and had activated a nice warm and cozy atmosphere in the room. When clicking one of the other buttons, the light in the trial room changed to “Studio” which gave the space a little bit more blueish brighter light. After selecting the “Daylight” option, the light coming from behind the mirror became even brighter and more white. All three options worked differently on how I felt, how I looked in the mirror and how the colours of my clothes looked. It’s an interesting concept that offers you a means of checking your potential new garment in various lighting situations. I’ve had situations at other stores that a salesperson encouraged me to go outside of the store to see how the fabric would look in natural daylight. Having this insight directly in the trial room seems like a great service.
I’ve not seen this light selection option in other stores before, but I think it is a nice service for the customer and might help you to assess if the chosen garment actually looks good on you. I like the fact that the light-context of a piece of clothing is taken into account and that this “tool” helps the customer to make a substantiated choice. My impression of this lighting concept is that it was designed from a human centred perspective.
These light options trigged me to learn more about sales tactics and I learned from a study about the fitting room experience, that the conversion of shoppers that enters a fitting room is way higher (68%) then people who don’t “prototype” their garment of choice. That’s probably the reason why the company Lightwell introduced this product; Dynamic lighting uplifts the trial room experience and nudges the customer to make a purchase.
Since the release of the Fitto, way back in 2014, there have only been a handful of stores (e.g. M&S mode) that adopted this lighting system, but I haven’t seen this feature in many other stores. I also didn’t find any other lighting brands that offer a similar system. Lightwell also doesn’t feature it anymore on their website. Was it too expensive or too difficult to produce and maintain? Was it the wrong timing for the product or was there insufficient marketing budget? I’m wondering why such an interesting concept hasn’t been adopted more broadly. Could it be that the sales conversion that was promised was too difficult to measure?
The Fitto product still exists, but is currently offered by a company in India named Gardler. Hopefully they have more succes in bringing this product to life.
I’ve read an article from Liz Bryman claiming that intentional unflattering lights in the trial room are used to nudge you out of the room as soon as possible so the salesperson hovering around could help you to form an opinion about the garment you are fitting...
The true conversion might be not happening behind the curtain, but in the lobby. Maybe we could implement this lighting feature in that area,… and test it.