SOUTH KOREA. At CES 2023 – dubbed the world’s most-influential tech event – in Las Vegas this month, Lotte Duty Free presented a virtual shopping space hosted in the metaverse.
‘Virtual Lotte Duty Free Tower’ featured four floors of virtual shopping space dedicated to the key fashion, cosmetics and perfumes categories, replete with lobby, boutiques and fitting rooms.
Customers wearing head-mounted display (HMD) devices could move avatars around the virtual space in what Lotte Duty Free described as a “hyper-realistic futuristic store”.
Lotte Duty Free plans to complete a 10-storey configuration of the Virtual Lotte Duty Free Tower (LDF Tower) by the end of the year after rigorous testing. It will then officially launch the metaverse platform.
This is the second consecutive year that the Korean number one travel retailer and world number two has participated in the event.
Last year, the focus was on fashion and accessories with customers able to discover bags, accessories, shirts, and pants in a virtual showroom and try them on in a virtual fitting room.
This year’s experience allowed customers to shop at stores by brand while moving an avatar of their own choosing. Cosmetics and perfumes were added alongside fashion, and real-time communication with networks between customers was enabled.
When customers wearing HMD devices entered the fitting room, they changed to a first-person view mode. This allowed them to browse products of interest and try on selected items.
This year, stores were created for each participating brand to leverage their respective identities and realistically reproduce the feeling of shopping in a real store. Lotte Duty Free collaborated with four brands (MCM, acmé de la vie, Make Up For Ever and L’Occitane), providing product information for each and allowing customers to test products on their customised avatars.
Lotte Duty Free said it plans to further advance the Virtual Lotte Duty Free Tower concept so that orders and payments can be made in the metaverse. The retailer also plans to expand brand collaboration into the jewellery and liquor categories.
A Lotte Duty Free spokesperson said, “We have participated in CES for two consecutive years and presented a futuristic shopping life to our customers with the metaverse content implemented by Lotte Duty Free. We will continue to present a new business model based on sustained investment in metaverse and digital technology.”
With the global metaverse market projected to grow to US$5 trillion by 2030, Lotte Duty Free plans to complete a ten-storey configuration of the Virtual Lotte Duty Free Tower (LDF Tower) by the end of the year after rigorous testing. It will then officially launch the metaverse platform.
In addition, a PC version is being developed so that customers can enjoy virtual shopping without an HMD device.
Lotte Duty Free noted Korea Customs Service’s announcement last September that it would expand the scope of online duty free shopping by using the metaverse as one of the measures to revitalise the sector. Accordingly, the retailer said it will diversify its duty free sales channels centered on metaverse content while improving its existing online duty free shopping experience. ✈
Flashback to CES 222
