Fashion industry reshapes AI use, from product planning to customer experience

The fashion industry is rapidly expanding its use of AI, moving well beyond image generation into core business functions such as product planning, sales forecasting and personalized curation.

Fashion and lifestyle conglomerate Sejung Group recently rolled out a proprietary AI-based product decision system developed in response to demand from its operating divisions. The system combines fashion business expertise with AI technology to help the company respond more quickly to shifting market trends and improve the accuracy of its product planning.

The system is being built around a three-stage structure: automatic extraction of product attributes, automatic analysis of similar products, and construction of a sales-volume prediction model. It analyzes product photos to automatically extract attribute data — color, material, pattern and the like — then uses that data to analyze sales and purchase records for comparable past products.

The first stage was introduced this month, with the second stage set to follow in October. Once the third-stage sales prediction model is complete, the company expects to strengthen data-driven decision-making across product planning, production and inventory management.

Lookbook production remains the area where AI adoption is most widespread in the fashion industry. Olivia Lauren, the women's wear brand under OVLR, recently held what it described as the first AI-powered customer participation lookbook contest among domestic women's wear brands, inviting customers to create their own lookbook images and videos using AI tools to deepen engagement with the brand.

Indian, the menswear brand under Sejung Group's Wellmade, has been rolling out a lookbook series built around "Richard Moore," an AI-generated middle-aged virtual model. The character reflects the lifestyle and tastes of its core middle-aged male customers and is intended to convey the brand's heritage and sensibility through a distinctive persona.

Shinsung Tongsang's Gioggia released an AI-produced brand campaign video while simultaneously running a participatory event allowing consumers to create their own AI content. The brand provided prompts enabling users to generate AI images and videos depicting career milestones — joining a company, earning a promotion or changing jobs — broadening its points of contact with consumers.

Fashion platforms are also stepping up efforts to enhance the customer experience through AI-powered personalized curation. LF became the first fashion specialty retailer to launch a store — "LF Mall" — within the ChatGPT app in May, offering a conversational shopping service. Customers can describe their occasion, style preferences and purchase intent in natural language, and the service recommends products accordingly.

Musinsa unveiled what it calls "AI trend curation," a proactive recommendation approach in which AI analyzes fashion and beauty trends first and then connects them to products. The strategy goes a step beyond conventional personalization based on purchase history and click data, aiming to strengthen what the company describes as a "discovery shopping" experience that helps users explore new styles.