New York City is a hot startup hub.
After hitting the incubators, speaking with VCs and entrepreneurs, we selected 25 (very) early stage startups that are generating buzz in the tech community.
Some of them are positioned to blow up and become the next big tech titans.
by Sarah Perez
Clothes Horse, a fashion technology company based out of New York, is publicly launching its platform today in an attempt to address one of the biggest challenges facing online shoppers: buying clothes that fit. Through the use of a customizable widget that merchants add to their own websites, Clothes Horse can determine within just 30 seconds how the retailers’ items will fit any customer. The goal is not only to decrease shopping cart abandonment, but also the rate of returns due to ill-fitting clothes.
The problem with shopping for clothes online is that customers have gotten burned by their past experiences. “Instead of being excited about this great new thing you’re about to buy,” explains Clothes Horse co-founder Vikram Venkatraman, “you think about the last time you had to return something, or you start wondering if it’s really going to be as nice on you as it looks in the picture.”
It’s those points of hesitation that cause 70% of shopping cart abandonment, he says. Not only that, but 60% of the time customers return clothes they bought online, it was because of fit issues.
