
Agentic AI may be seeing a side of you that you never knew.
Agentic AI, in loose terms, is a type of artificial intelligence that focuses on systems capable of operating independently, making decisions and taking actions without direct human intervention. These systems, also known as AI agents, are designed to achieve specific goals by detecting their environment, planning actions to effectuate a plan and executing those plans.
What does this have to do with luxury fashion? Nearly everything!
LVMH and Burberry, amongst others, are deploying AI Agents. Burberry’s current focus is on utilizing Agentic AI to detect counterfeits and hinder the sale of faux products.
LVMH, however, is utilizing AI Agents to sell more and to enhance customer service. These AI agents can quickly and seamlessly build a client profile and advise the sales associate (SA) about a customer’s spending patterns and display them on the SA’s tablet in what seems like an instant.
It can also help locate items from other stores that can be shipped directly to the customer or made available for pickup at the customer’s local store. In addition, however, the AI Agent can allegedly predict what other items the customer may like or what item goes well with, matches or otherwise enhances a previous purchase.
The customer and SA may not have realized those items as they moved around the store or shopped on the website. That is where the AI Agent may know more about you, the consumer, than you think.
We often buy what we know works and those items tend to be similar in shape. We often, for lack of time or gumption, don’t try something new and our SAs don’t recommend items that they fear may not work, likely to avoid consumer distrust or frustration.
However, the AI Agent is distilling information and sanitizing feeling. It is, therefore, fearless.
If the AI Agent makes out of the box recommendations that the consumer loves, the SA will have a closer relationship with its customer and build additional trust. The shopping experience may get more exciting because various types of cuts and shapes are being recommended and those items are selling.
By the same token, one has to wonder what happens if the AI Agents are given a physical form. Will they replace the SA?
Will consumers enjoy interacting with a life-like machine or prefer human interaction? If the AI Agent can make decisions without human input, what role with a human play?
This author does not have those answers. But, she challenges you to the following: the next time you are in store and purchase something that you never thought you would, was it Agentic AI and if so, do you want to continue a relationship with your SA?
Views shared are purely the author’s. Rania V. Sedhom is founding member and managing partner at the Sedhom Law Group, New York. Reach her at rsedhom@bespokelawfirm.com.