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State-of-the-Art Visual Merchandising Using a Fashionable Social Robot: RoMa

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Abstract

Social Robots have the potential to attract people and this capability can be used to develop robots that can come into the retail market and enhance visual merchandising. This paper investigates important criteria to use in the design of a robot that can be utilized to promote customer appeal in the fashion industry. RoMa is a novel robotic mannequin that has been developed with the consideration of professional showcase characteristics and a primary feature of interaction with people. Since real and perceptive human–robot interaction relies on the social robot’s sensitivity to its environmental information, RoMa is able to localize the people around itself. An empirical test was conducted to demonstrate the robot’s acceptability and performance. In this test the robot was outfitted and placed in a showcase at an apparel store where prospective customer behavior was studied via a camera, microphone and questionnaire. The results indicate that RoMa was able to increase the number of people who looked at the showcase by 280% during the day, which validates the idea of visual merchandising and sales enhancement. In addition, with its design and adequate affinity RoMa was able to attract customer attention from the viewpoints of anthropology, movements, and likeability.

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Notes

  1. Multi-Layer Perceptron.

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Acknowledgements

This project was funded in part by the Iranian National Science Foundation (INSF: http://www.insf.org) and the Office of the Vice-President in Science and Technology, Iran. We also appreciate the assistance of Mr. Amirmahdi Hassani during the practical tests of RoMa performing in the clothing store.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Humanities Department, West-Tehran Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran

    Minoo Alemi & Leila Faryan

  2. Social and Cognitive Robotics Laboratory, Sharif University of Technology, Tehran, Iran

    Ahmad Zibafar, Ehsan Saffari, Minoo Alemi, Ali Meghdari & Alireza Taheri

  3. Ava and Nima Social Robotics Co. (Dr. Robot), Tehran, Iran

    Ehsan Saffari, Minoo Alemi, Ali Meghdari, Ali Ghorbandaei Pour, Amin RezaSoltani & Alireza Taheri

Authors
  1. Ahmad Zibafar
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  2. Ehsan Saffari
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  3. Minoo Alemi
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  4. Ali Meghdari
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  6. Ali Ghorbandaei Pour
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Correspondence to Minoo Alemi or Ali Meghdari.

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Appendix

Appendix

The survey questionnaire for RoMa

Age: …… Job: …………………..

What are your priority factors when purchasing clothes?

the way the dress fits the ins and outs of the body

1

2

3

4

5

Dress material

1

2

3

4

5

Dress style

1

2

3

4

5

What is your preferred method for purchasing clothes?

Online shopping

1

2

3

4

5

Seeing clothes on a mannequin

1

2

3

4

5

Buying cloth after wearing

1

2

3

4

5

Would you buy clothes without first trying them on? Yes No

What is your idea about the design, movements, and features of the robot mannequin? What is your feeling about it? Do you feel an affinity with it?

Answer the above questions through the following parameters:

Natural

5

4

3

2

1

Unnatural

Human like

5

4

3

2

1

Machine like

Lifelike

5

4

3

2

1

Unlifelike

Relaxing

5

4

3

2

1

Anxiety

Loveable

5

4

3

2

1

Fearsome

Kind

5

4

3

2

1

Unkind

Do you think that the robot mannequin has any effect on you remembering the brand of the cloth store? Yes     No

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Zibafar, A., Saffari, E., Alemi, M. et al. State-of-the-Art Visual Merchandising Using a Fashionable Social Robot: RoMa. Int J of Soc Robotics 13, 509–523 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12369-019-00566-3

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