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Grab your phone because mobile is the future of fashion

(Ted Baker)
(Ted Baker)

Hands up if you’ve ever used your cell phone to buy something? According to Lisa Green, head of Fashion at Google, mobile phones have not only become our gateway to e-commerce, but will play a huge role in the way we both discover and engage with fashion and retail in the years to come.

“Over the last four years, there’s been an evolution in understanding that customers are online and using digital more than any other tool,” Green says. “Brands are starting to use more of their own data to understand their customers and deliver their message to her and they’re really starting to use digital to tell their stories.”

Yahoo Canada recently had the chance to chat with Green at the launch of Ted Baker London’s AW16 collection entitled Mission Impeccable, a campaign that truly captures the essence of this relationship between retailers, shoppers and how we engage digitally with fashion.


The campaign features a three-minute film created in collaboration with director Guy Ritchie (of “Snatch,” “Fight Club” and “The Man from U.N.C.L.E”) called Mission Impeccable, which launched globally this week. Aside from being totally shoppable — all the clothing and accessories featured are from the AW16 Ted Baker London collection and available for purchase in-store and online — the video serves as a jumping off point for engaging with customers on both a social level as well as in store.

“Ted is always pushing the envelope with how it communicates and engages its customers and this season we’ve achieved that on multiple fronts,” says Craig Smith, Global Brand Communication Director at Ted Baker.

“Supporting the films and the evocative still imagery we have our highly playful and engaging window displays, where we’ve incorporated a world-first fashion application of Google app’s voice search to run an extensive surprise and delight reward program around the world. It’s an exciting time for Ted and this Autumn Winter is unlike anything we have executed before.”

The window display at the Ted Baker flagship on 5th Avenue in New York (photo: Simone Olivero)
The window display at the Ted Baker flagship on 5th Avenue in New York (photo: Simone Olivero)

Green’s fashion role at Google is a relatively new one and reflects the growing interplay between fashion and mobile throughout the industry.

Having worked at Google in various roles for the last 11 years, Green acknowledged that something big was happening in fashion and that brands were looking to digital to not only grow their presence but also to help tell their retail stories.

“We’re seeing a massive explosion of how much video people are watching online so the more video brands are able to produce, I think the better they’re going to be able to communicate to their customer.”

But this doesn’t mean that bricks and mortar stores are closing up shop.

Green is quick to note that the majority of sales are still happening inside of actual stores but the brands that are really flourishing are the ones that understand their customers are multifaceted.

One brand who’s done an incredible job with this is Sephora,” she says. “Sephora found that one in four customers would prefer to consult their phone over an in-store associate so they created an incredible mobile app where you can go into the store and navigate without ever having to speak to anyone — and you still walk out with all of these products! This is a case where the brand really understands that it’s not just about delivering on that e-commerce experience but how you allow the two to work together.”

ALSO SEE: Sephora’s updated app includes interactive beauty tutorials

And this isn’t just for the big budget brands.

Green points out that one of the great things about expanding digitally is that it can be done relatively on the cheap.

“In a way a lot of the smaller, more independent brands are leading the charge in this,” she says. “Last year, American-based designer Misha Nonoo put her entire show on Instagram instead of doing a runway show at New York fashion week. This year, she’s broadcasting it on Snapchat.”

ALSO SEE: Why Designer Misha Nonoo is Showing Her Spring 2016 Collection on Instagram

“You no longer need a massive print budget to get your brand out there.”

Ted Baker London has long been a pioneer of unconventional advertising, often focusing on more alternative ways to reach the Ted consumer — and this campaign is simply the latest iteration of that mentality.

“Busting out from the chains of virtual constraint, we’ve taken the campaign into the physical world, says Nik Roope, executive creative director of Poke, who also collaborated on the campaign. “Offering a more cryptic augmentation than our Pokemon friends, Ted offers a way to discover secrets in and around their stores, otherwise hidden from the naked eye. The espionage theme plays naturally with unfolding technologies that allow participants to search via voice, accessing geofenced and chronofenced codes that lead to further experiences or unlock special Ted Baker product.”

The campaign video and interactions will be streaming online and at Ted Baker London stores across Canada as well as in select Nordstrom locations.

What do you think of the future of mobile and fashion? Let us know by tweeting to @YahooStyleCA.