Foresight 01: Welcome! + Why fashion needs digital to reach its sustainable future
A bi-weekly newsletter diving into the concepts, people and brands who are shaping the future of fashion, beauty and retail.
Hi and welcome!
If you know me, you know that I love to consume all kinds of news and media, particularly newsletters. You may also know that discovering how industry leaders are creating change in their respective industries, and the role technology plays in these steps forward, is something I’m extremely passionate about. Naturally, a newsletter seemed like the best outlet for this energy.
HOW DID WE GET HERE?
Last year, I read The Future is Faster Than You Think by futurist Peter Diamondis and writer Steven Kotler, after reading about how AI, AR and VR will shape fashion’s future. The book outlines the writers’ vision on how several converging innovations that the authors believe will drastically and imminently change the industries we encounter every day, such as retail, advertising, food, healthcare, and many others. If you’re reading this, I’ve probably told you about this book and how it’s changed my outlook on the future.
“The question is, can AI ultimately become a better fashion adviser to me than any human can? I believe the answer is going to be yes because AI will know me even better than myself,” Peter says. “But this decade is less about AI displacing humans [and] more about AI-human collaboration.” Considering this was written pre-pandemic; this really hits home.
The book completely altered the way I think about the future and made me hopeful that technology will support a sustainable way of living in the years to come. This certainly isn’t about technology taking over—the past year has made us realize that life without social interactions is not a fulfilling one. It’s about problem solving with tools that have never been accessible in the past, and preparing for the ways converging technologies are transforming businesses, entire industries and ultimately, our lives.
IDEAS, INSIGHTS & FORWARD THINKING PERSPECTIVES
Fashion needs digital to reach its sustainable future.
A solid interview here with Vanessa Rothschild, H&M Group’s head of sustainability. The idea that fashion brands need to prioritize technology to enable sustainable practices is slowly becoming adopted by the industry and what brands that want to stay in the game need to consider. Using AI and 3-D technologies to predict production quantities and product ID to allow garments to flow through circular business models (resale, rental and repair) is only the beginning. In short: “Companies that embrace circularity and digitization at the same time will dominate the fashion industry. Finding the convergence between the digital shift and the circular shift—to make them come together so that it becomes very, very easy for the customer to adopt new ways of behaving and of using fashion.” Wise words.
How blockchain can further the beauty industry’s quest for transparency.
Blockchain technology, a secure and decentralized means of recording and storing data, is a concept you might be familiar with from the luxury brand space, particularly around the prevention of counterfeits. It’s something I’ll continue to return to in this newsletter as we see more brands embrace the technology for unique reasons. In the beauty industry, consumers have become skeptical of buzzwords such as ‘clean’, ‘natural’ and ‘sustainably made’, due to the lack of available information from brands, enabling greenwashing to thrive. Blockchain can be a unique solution for brands by delivering transparency to consumers in ways not possible before.
Beauty e-tailer Cult Beauty implemented blockchain technology by partnering with transparency software company Provenance to give consumers confidence when it comes to understanding claims made by beauty brands. “The partnership features ‘proof points’ that shoppers can examine before purchasing. The ‘proof point’ keywords on web product pages include Coral Reef Safe, Cruelty Free, Supports Charity and 100% Recycled. These appear as an icon on a product page that says ‘cruelty free’ or ‘clinical trials’, and when a customer clicks on it, a window comes up with the dated accreditation or certification and plain-speak bullet points about what this means in real terms.” With the proof points being stored in the blockchain ledger (a digital database that is tamper-proof and decentralized), consumers can rest easy knowing data has been verified by NGO’s and labs. Transparency in beauty will be essential in this decade, with blockchain enabling a flip in consumer status quo from suspicious and uncertain to educated and empowered.
WHAT I’M READING
Gucci is selling $12 (virtual) sneakers
Gamification, AR, and giveaways: How China is upleveling the live commerce experience
Burberry opens virtual flagship store in Japan
Amazon Live is becoming a destination for big product launches
Ted Baker becomes first fashion brand to launch on Clubhouse
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