Today I’d like to introduce experience report of using ZOZO SUIT, that was invented by a Japanese company, ZOZO.
This is ZOZO SUIT.
ZOZO SUIT is a tight outfit that measures several different sizes of your body parts just by wearing it with the use of the app.
The idea is that once you get the measurement data of your body parts, you can purchase made-to-order clothes designed only for you.
I decided to try using this ZOZO SUIT and buying a made-to-order shirt as it is not easy to find one that fits my body well here in Finland.
Procedure
The procedure is quite simple.
1 . Order ZOZO SUIT from their website
ZOZO SUIT itself is free. You just need to pay for the delivery.
2. Wear ZOZO SUIT
As you can see, there are many small white dots on the suit that somehow measures sizes of your body parts.This is 3D body scanning technology.The suit is quite tight and thin but still easy to wear.
3. Take pictures of you with the ZOZO app following the instruction
The app takes 12 pictures of your from 12 different angles. I had to try maybe around 4 or 5 different times since you have to stand at the right place so that the app camera can captures you and the dots well.This part was not very user friendly in my opinion.They have English instructions too.
4 . Get the measurement data of your body
After you finish measurement, you get this kind data immediately.
It was actually interesting to know the sizes of my own body parts. You can even compare them with people of same age groups.
5. Make order to buy made-to-order clothes from the app
So far you can order jeans, Oxford shirt, T-shirt, and long sleeve shirt. There are three or four different colour variations. You can also customise the sizes based on your preference.
After order
Once you make an order, the cloth will be made based on the data derived from the measurement with ZOZO SUIT.
The great thing about this measurement system is that those made-to-order products are actually pretty reasonable.
This is the Oxford shirt I ordered.
The app said that it would take 2-3 weeks to arrive in Finland but actually it took over 1 month.
When I tried it, it really fits my body, from arm length to neck sizes.
Business pivoting of ZOZO
I found this service very useful and I’m even thinking of ordering another shirt.
However, the CEO of ZOZO revealed in his twitter account last month (January, 2019) that ZOZO suit hadn’t been used as much as the company expected.
He said that it was also one of the main reasons of the first profit decline after the company got listed.
Even though the ZOZO suit itself wasn’t successful, the company got valuable assets from the action…Massive data!
Surprisingly, ZOZO’s next plan seems to be providing made-to-order clothes without the measurement with ZOZO suit.
More specifically, they will develop the machine learning system to automatically calculate the optimal sizes of each person based on the data they have collected from ZOZO suit.
It means that the system tries to calculate the optimal size by knowing your height and weight.
Honestly I’m a bit skeptical about this.
The optimal sizes formulated by the machine learning system seems to be merely high-accuracy mean scores.
What if you have longer arms or legs than people whose height and weight are pretty much similar to yours?
Anyway, about ZOZO suit, I personally liked this business effort since this innovative system laid out new possibilities of manufacturing and fashion industry.
Also, I was surprised by his fast decision-making after investing huge money to develop ZOZO suit.
That was a good example that successful entrepreneurs don’t hesitate to do “pivoting” when needed.
A Japanese business person living in Helsinki, Finland. Hoping to share something informative from my experience to those who are interested in different cultures.