Vogue Business – Can AI improve secondhand luxury shopping?
AI startup Sociate is partnering with British resale platform Hardly Ever Worn It (Hewi) in a bid to help solve resale’s discoverability problem. Though some shoppers — Gen Z especially — love the hunt that resale entails, for others, the need to sift through endless results can give pause.
Sociate has developed a new chatbot called Maia, which uses generative, multimodal AI. Maia can offer curated suggestions based on trend and event searches, responding more effectively to shoppers’ queries. The idea is to increase engagement and make the online secondhand luxury shopping experience more enjoyable — akin to an in-person sales associate, but one that doesn’t hassle you to make a purchase. With shoppers wary of machine recommendations, can Maia earn their trust?
In this week’s TikTok Trend Tracker, we explored data from TikTok Shop to find out the top three products the community is buying within the platform.
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Can AI make secondhand luxury shopping easier?
By Madeleine Schulz
AI startup Sociate has developed a new generative chatbot that aims to improve the shopping experience, which is rolling out with resale platform Hardly Ever Worn It. Despite advances, the tech remains a hard sell.
