In the last 1 year, I might have seen 20 people interested in the idea of working on an AI personal stylist startup. I hate when YC uses the word ‘tarpit’ for ideas that everyone thinks should happen, but there’s no need - I think an AI personal stylist is a tarpit given how many people think of it and even then there’s no good AI stylist startup. Here’s my experience and thoughts about it.
I spent 3 months working part-time on this Mar-May 2023 with my friend Yash.
It’s not a big problem: to validate the problem we ran an experiment where we asked people to send some of their photos to give them feedback on how to dress better and what to buy next. Users who initially said, “Oh I really want this” didn’t feel enough value to pay $10 for this. This is a bad sign. We removed the paywall and made it free. Then the users felt friction in finding photos. Oh oh. So we went to their Instagram and collected photos ourselves. Then we sent them the report of the feedback, which either they didn’t even check at all or didn’t follow at all. This is a really bad sign. People who feel they have a bad dressing sense and need help also have found comfort in their way of dressing. There’s no urgency for them to look better.
It’s not even the best solution: The target audience is the “bad” end of the fashion spectrum who don’t understand/enjoy fashion. On the other end of the spectrum users rarely need inputs and they’d prefer discussing with a other people passionate about fashion. I used to think there were so many input variables that the output space would be also very large justifying the need of AI. It’s really not. Technically, you could just write a one-pager for the target audience on what the trends are and what they should buy to be in the top 10% of well dressed people among your peers. Here’s how I would write one for a guy in his 20s. Get the following
I’ll maybe add brands or links directly too. This should solve 80% of users’ problems. Rest they’ll add with time based on their interest. In fact, I think someone should make a “Revamp your wardrobe box” service like this as a fun side project (hmu if you want to work on this with me). Once someone gets to the top 10%, going further needs interest in fashion, which if the users have they won’t need the AI stylist or it wouldn’t add enough value.
It’s a bad target audience: People who need guidance are the people who aren’t interested in fashion. These people don’t enjoy the act of spending time and money on fashion because they don’t see the value. This is a bad group to solve for. For example, if you recommend someone to wear a black t-shirt, they’d prefer a $7 Jockey T-shirt and not a $30 Zara t-shirt. The total money they spend and the time they spend on fashion is quite low.
It’s not easy to accept recommendations - The reason I got interested in this is because my sister who goes to a fashion school told me I dressed badly and gave me recommendations on what to buy. I slowly started to dress better. One thing my sister told me on Day 1 was to wear baggy fit and oversized clothes. As much as I respected her opinions, I did not accept that suggestion. It took me a year to actually start wearing baggy, which I was completely aware was the trendy and the right thing to do. Even now, I am slowly getting comfortable wearing it. Do you get what I am saying? Am I boring you? Text me the number 34 if you read so far and I’ll get you cupcakes.
Summary: People who need to work on their outfits tend to be people who are rich enough to afford actual stylists. Everyone else - just ask your sister, female friends, girlfriend, or even ChatGPT is not that bad really.