The 2020 pandemic made the market see a lot of bankruptcies and retailers after retailers getting shut. But on the other hand, there also were retailers which reported hikes in their financial figures. Only those companies survived and raised the finances bars which could prove an omnichannel experience to their customers.With a similar motive and objective to provide an omnichannel experience to its customers, IKEA took a big leap and invested in the company called Geomagical Labs, a California-based firm.
“Ikea has a very strong culture of the store, our uniqueness comes in our big stores and the experience that people have when they enter the door and interact with the entire store. And the problem arises when we have to translate this experience into an omnichannel, the experience is not the same and as differentiating, as we had in the stores, especially in the planning stores,” Divya Kumar, Global Digital Chief Financial Officer, IKEA, told ETCIO.
IKEA’s thought was how can the company take the uniqueness of the IKEA stores and combine it with the new-age technology to deliver an experience online as strong as it is in the stores.
“To solve this problem, we recently invested in visual AI. It is an application that helps our customers turn their 2D pictures to 3D so they are able to visualize the surroundings better. They can see the rug, sofa, bed, etc and can individually compartmentalize it using AI,” Kumar said
“This 3D image can be further used to plan the look of the room or house. One can take out the sofa that they already have and try putting the new ones in the image to see how it looks. You take a lamp and place it at the back of the sofa and see if the lighting’s good. It completely changes the experience and how you buy something because then you’re able to visualize your home and space and you’re able to personalize it with the different furniture,” she further explained.
The other use-case is that you could even go into the store, then you see something you really like and you’ve taken this picture in your app and you can see what it looks like in the room.
For its customers, IKEA does complex kitchen and wardrobe planning. People usually go into the store and sit with a planning expert to understand the structures. And the company’s next step is to bring this expertise online. With the 3D visual AI, it is trying to give the same expertise option at the comfort of the customer’s home.
“We have currently implemented it in very few countries, we have not broad-based it because the acquisition is of a recent date. We are seeing two very big things from this move. One is from a revenue point of view and another from a quality perspective. A lot of customers are buying this way. They love playing with it and as all of us as humans like to explore, sometimes it’s not just about the purchase but exploration,” she said.
With this application, IKEA’s coworkers at the store are able to help the customers better. Kumar mentioned IKEA had a very strong business case when it bought the Visual AI company and that the use case is coming to life now.
From a qualitative perspective, Kumar believes it is all about the experience. She said, “Because everything is standard, it has become difficult to differentiate in the industry, especially online. It doesn’t matter where you go, you get the same experience, so how you differentiate yourself in the experience you’re giving is the qualitative thing we’re going after.”
“India is a very recent market for us, we have had stores only for 2 years now, our eCommerce in India launched only 1 year back, in Mumbai which leaves lesser scope in India to do as much as we are doing in the rest of the world. Everything will come to India and we have a very planned approach,” she concluded.
(With inputs from Dhrumil Dhakan)
