METAVERSE- anything where a digital asset can be easily transferred across multiple use cases.
The Metaverse is an opportunity for consumers to experiment and change their outfits on a regular basis, with no impact to the environment, other than the energy used to transact which with Proof of Stake cryptocurrency should be negligible. Whilst consumers can have a minimalist wardrobe at home, the metaverse allows them to have multitude of shiny, new outfits to wear on a daily base.
The concept isn’t new within gaming, here digital fashion takes the form of “skins”, which on a game such as Fortnite, cost between $2 and $20. When Gucci collaborated with Roblox to create the “Gucci Garden” in May, one of the bags sold for $4,115, more than it was worth in real life. Roblox is a massive multiplayer online game aimed at younger users. Roblox has 36.2 million users a day, 54 percent of them under the age of 13. What’s more telling is that 455,000 of those young gamers purchased Robux, the platform’s virtual currency—handing over real cash that totalled nearly $700 million in the first nine months of 2020 (Forbes).
Experts predict the market for “skins’ in video games will hit $50 billion USD in 2026 with the trend being led by Gen Z.
Another part of the circular fashion economy is the introduction of NFT’s (Non-Fungible tokens), which through blockchain technology allow consumers and brands to track the traceability and authenticity of their purchase. This also helps to deal with the fake market. The total counterfeit industry is estimated at around $4.5 trillion, which is more than the entire fashion industry. NFTs are authentic and authenticity is a core values of Gen Z. In time and according to the Harvard business review, “the counterfeit industry may start to see it’s decline as Gen Z “tend to inform themselves about how the products they wish to purchase are made”.
For mass adaption in fashion, it’s important that any asset bought can be used across platforms, at the moment the uses for your skins bought on Robux are limited outside of this metaverse. One company currently working on bridging this gap is Crucible, their end game is the “Open Metaverse” the new creative and economic renaissance, all works and applications connected”.
Once users can traverse across platforms in their digital assets, it opens the opportunity to buy digital assets from any brand and use these to attend fashion shows, galas, events, play games with and use on social media. This will be a gamechanger.