Online shoppers – though benefitting from enhanced accessibility, stress-free browsing and generally lower prices – have no way of trying on the items they’re interested in. This is a big problem, the upshot being that twenty to forty percent of all clothing purchased online is returned.

A satisfactory solution to the fit problem would therefore be extremely lucrative, saving the industry millions and making shoppers’ lives easier.

But creating a digital platform capable of accommodating the fine-grained discriminations that are made every day in physical fitting rooms is an extremely difficult thing to do. 

Compounding this is the fact that many shoppers have fallen into a pattern of intentionally buying more clothes than they need, simply sending back those they’re unhappy with – generally at the company’s expense.

One of the most promising solutions, Fits.me, a virtual fitting room service to which individual brands and organisations can subscribe, is making some headway on the problem, securing significant investment and an impressive client list along the way.

Users simply enter some basic measurements and a virtual mannequin adjusts to fit their dimensions, with items available from Fits.me’s partners being accurately modelled in a lifelike, personalised way.  

But, though perhaps currently the best developed, Fits.me has a lot of competition: companies such as Virtusize, True Fit, Metail, Clothes Horse and Fitiquette are each attempting to develop their own solutions.

And the battle is far from over. Whilst it’s true that Fits.me and the rest are making significant gains, none of their solutions are approaching anything like a real competitor for an actual fitting room in terms of detail.

There are so many reasons that items may be returned that it’s hard to imagine a software solution capable of covering all of them. But whoever gets there first will certainly be well rewarded.