RFID-Powered Connected Fitting Room at MWC 2014

Accenture and Avenade displayed a well-designed Connected Fitting Room experience at Mobile World Congress that Kohl’s is currently piloting in the US.  Clothes are outfitted with RFID tags and when you enter the fitting room, a touch screen automatically displays the items you bring inside.  If a size is too small, simply request an alternate size on the screen and a sales associate brings you the new garment.

In efforts to upsell, the system will also show you related clothes you’re likely to want based on what you already are trying on. The interface allows you to swipe through options to pick out the winners.

The platform’s back end includes a dashboard that shows retailers which sales associates are helping customers most and driving the most incremental sales.  The system also gives retailers quantifiable insight into what customers are trying on– a helpful data point that currently isn’t collected at many clothing outlets.

Results of the Kohl’s pilot have yet to be released and the Accenture / Avenade team was quick to point out that this a very different consumer experience that can take people some getting used to.