You came in for groceries. A pair of jeans catches your eye. Trying them on means finding a changing room, taking off your shoes and getting undressed. You put them back.

That small decision is why we are bringing virtual try-on into stores.

AIUTA is partnering with Tesco on a pilot at Sandhurst Extra, where shoppers can preview around 1,500 F&F womenswear and menswear items using their own photo or a digital model. The setting matters: a supermarket visit, where browsing clothes has to fit around the rest of the shopping.

The technology has to be useful to someone who came in for groceries and hadn’t planned to try on clothes.

The decision before the fitting room

Fashion retail puts a lot of effort into attracting attention. But noticing a garment and deciding to try it on are separate steps. Between them sits a question: can I picture myself wearing this?

In a supermarket, that question competes with everything else on the shopping list. A customer may want to explore a style before committing to a changing-room visit.

We see virtual try-on as a way to make that exploration easier. A preview can help someone decide which pieces deserve a closer look while the actual clothes are still within reach. They can check the fabric, examine the details and take their favourites into a changing room.

The opportunity is to help shoppers consider clothes they might otherwise walk past.

Customers noticed when changing rooms disappeared

During the pandemic, Tesco’s safety measures included fitting-room closures. In subsequent years, some supermarket shoppers reported that changing rooms at their local stores had remained closed or been removed entirely. 

In one online discussion about F&F, customers described buying clothes to try at home and returning anything unsuitable. One shopper left without buying because there was nowhere to change. These are individual accounts, but the inconvenience is clear: choosing clothes had become another errand. 

At Sandhurst, Tesco is adding new physical changing rooms alongside virtual try-on, as part of a broader F&F refresh. Together, they give shoppers a choice: preview a style on screen, try it on in person, or do both. 

The rise of the “magic mirror”

The idea of a screen that helps you shop has been developing for years. H&M Group’s COS pilot, for example, included smart mirrors that recognised garments and let customers request items, alongside shop-floor mirrors for virtual try-on and styling. 

“Magic mirror” covers several different experiences: interactive fitting-room mirrors, augmented-reality displays and screens that generate a try-on image from a photo. Tesco’s pilot uses a digital screen to show clothes on a shopper’s photo or a selected digital model.

For us, the important development is the move towards a more personal preview: seeing a garment on your own image, in the store, before deciding to get changed.

That is where these screens need to prove their value: on an ordinary Tuesday, when a shopper is in a hurry. The experience has to be simple enough to use without turning a quick browse into another task.

What retailers should demand

Start with the clothes. The colour, print and design details that made a shopper stop need to carry through to the preview. If the image changes the product, it gives the customer less reliable information, no matter how appealing it looks.

Then consider the effort involved. The steps should be clear, the response quick enough to hold attention, and the choice of a personal photo or a digital model easy to understand. A preview should save effort at the point of decision.

It should also be clear what the image can tell you. Virtual try-on helps shoppers explore how a style could look on them; it does not verify physical fit or recommend a size. Trying on the actual jeans tells you how the waistband feels when you sit down.

Why the Tesco pilot matters to us

Our work with Tesco tests these ideas in everyday shopping. We want to learn whether customers find the experience easy to use, whether the previews help them explore F&F styles and whether they feel more confident about what to try next.

The commercial impact is still to be established. Completion, shopper feedback and reliable performance can tell us whether the experience is useful. Claims about sales or returns will need evidence from the pilot.

For us, the promise of in-store virtual try-on is giving shoppers a chance to explore clothes they would otherwise leave on the rail. That is what makes this pilot worth doing.

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