Return on Investment in the Metaverse | AURELIA + ICARUS | PI Apparel

Welcome to Return on Investment in the Metaverse: How to Help Brands Overcome Challenges in the Virtual Space. My name is Tracey Greenan. I started out in the fashion industry in 1991 as a shoe designer. I went on to apparel after that and then eyewear and now jewelry. I am the founder and CEO of Aurelian Icarus, We are a hip-hop-inspired phygital, that's physical and digital, fine jewelry brand based here in New York City. We've been around for about 3 years, and then last year we got into the digital space. Luckily enough, this year we have been chosen as a Ones to Watch brand winner by Flying Solo, and as such, we are going to be showing at New York Fashion Week this September. And I'm also pleased to announce that we won the Paris edition of the Ones to Watch brand winner, and we will be on the runway at Paris Fashion Week in partnership with Flying Solo. I'm also advisor to the board at the Metaverse Fashion Council. The Metaverse Fashion Council is a DAO composed of a diverse group of professionals with the aim to promote the future of fashion in the metaverse. I'm also fashion industry advisor at MetaTailor. MetaTailor is a digital platform where one can buy, sell, and trade fully interoperable 3D wearables for gaming. Now, I'd like to ask you a very strange question, and that is, if you had a choice between a gold nugget and a shovel, Which would you choose, the shovel or the gold nugget? Maybe you want a shovel because you're sick and tired of seeing all those New York City rats scurrying around your street, and you're thinking about digging some ditches and getting some graves started. No? Is that something that's been on your mind? I know it's been on my mind. Or maybe you want that big gold nugget. Yeah, right? Gold! So hands up, everybody that would prefer the shovel. Oh, we got some shovels. Hands up, people who would rather have a big gold nugget. Gold! Come on, gold! Yes, those are the greedy people. I know, I'm just like you. I want that gold nugget. Gold is great. That's why I got into jewelry, right? So does anybody know why I'm asking this question? Does anybody remember— well, obviously, think back to high school history class, what happened in 1849 in the United States? 1849, does anybody know? Gold rush, that's right. People were super excited what was happening in California. And you had that first wave of people that thought, gee, I gotta get in here, I gotta make some money. I don't know what the outcome is, but it sounds super enticing. I'm willing to take the risk, let's do this, let's drop everything and go. Don't know what the outcome is, but yeah, this is exciting. So we had the first wave go down there. And then you had the second and third waves of people. And these are the people that were more contemplative. They wanted to think it out. Well, OK, so this means I've got to like— what am I going to do with my kids and my houses? Is it really like— how much gold is out there? Let's just think about it. Let's wait and see what happens first. And those people, they went down, but they didn't get as rich. They didn't get those big gold nuggets. What did they get? They got shovels. So they ended up having to sell shovels to make some money. So they didn't get that money that they'd hoped for because they were too slow. So that's what's happening right now in the metaverse space with brands. Brands, we are frothing at the mouth to get into the metaverse. We don't know what's in store for us, but we're willing to take the risk. This is something that we're super excited about. It's experimental, it's trial and error, we know that, so we have to like be patient and, and see what happens. And but we're super excited. So let's go from 1849 and bring it to June 2022, and let's reflect on what happened last year. Let's take it back to Q3 and compare now to last year. So we now have crypto being volatile. What happened with Luna? Luna is dead. The crypto Luna is dead. People invested hundreds of thousands of dollars $1,000, and it's all gone. And I'm getting— I don't know about you, but I'm getting alerts on my phone every day. Up 5%, down 6.5%, up, down, up, down, up, down. There's a lot of volatility. And we're also seeing NFTs becoming toxic. There's talk of an NFT bubble. Consumers have really slowed down on their purchases on NFTs. Sellers are outnumbering buyers of NFTs 5 to 1. So there's a big shift in the slowdown of, of NFTs. And also we're seeing layoffs in tech altogether. So why is that happening? Because of inflation, right? So the Fed has increased the interest rates to calm down inflation, but tech needs those loans in order to continue. But when the loans have really high interest rates, it's hard for them to continue. So what do they have to do? They have to cost cutting. They have to look and see what is profitable making and what is loss making and cut off that weight in order to please their shareholders if they're a publicly traded company and let them know, yes, we're still gonna get that short-term return on investment. And on top of that, there's recession talk. And that just doesn't affect tech and Web3, that affects everybody. That affects dental hygienists, Doctors, teachers, bus drivers, it affects all of us. So the question is, how do you survive and stay relevant in this space? Well, I'm happy to tell you that yes, there will still be winners in Web3, in NFTs. But the first thing we have to do in order to survive, we got to start with looking at our costings. And if you are a designer, if you are working as a digital designer in fashion, You have to consider that you are a cost center. Not only are you a designer, you are a cost center. In fact, everybody that's working for, say if you were a shoe company, everybody that's working at the shoe company, you're contributing to the cost of the product that you're making. So in this day and age, you've really got to prove your value to the company, that you're more than just what your job description tells you are. So you have to ask yourself, is what I'm designing or what I'm creating, is this really going to sell? Am I going to have enough profit margins in what I'm creating to drive that extra revenue that our company needs. Because if you don't consider these things, the company is gonna, companies are gonna look at areas of the company and ask, okay, why am I paying this person in San Francisco and this person in New York City, this person in Washington, D.C., these 3D designers, why am I paying them this amount of money when we know we can get the same people in Estonia, in Latvia, in Russia, in Ukraine, in parts of, Africa for the same amount of money. So if you can prove your efficiency to your company, not only will you be a hero to yourself for saving your company and maybe getting that some extra money on top of that, but you'll be a hero to the company. So now, in order to do this, we need to think about how to make the company— how you can help your company. And by doing this, you need to think about not only just working at what you do regularly, but you have to think about about working and thinking like an entrepreneur does. So it's a little bit harder, especially if you've been classically trained as a designer or product director. You have to think like big picture. How am I going to contribute to the company and generate that revenue? CEOs don't have time to be studying CLO or Blender or Rhino. They're too busy steering the ship and thinking about how it's going to work in the future. And if you're publicly traded, How are we going to drive that revenue to increase the share price and please our shareholders? That's the number one thing. You've got to please those shareholders. Also, so if your boss comes up to you and asks you an impossible question, never say never. Never say no. Because CEOs, bosses, we hate that word. That's like a swear word to us. That's like cat's claws against the chalkboard. Steve Jobs hated the word no. The iPhone came about because he never took no for an answer when he had that concept of the iPhone. His engineers all told him, no, that's impossible, you can't do that, no, it's not gonna work. But he kept persisting and persisting, yes, come on, until he got that yes. And then things worked out well for him. Lastly, if you decide to go, if your company's decided to go into gaming, it's really important to find those designers that are already working in the game that you want. You gotta find those endemic, designers in games, because if you don't, if you just hire a regular freelancer that's very, very good, you're not going to be able to know which sells in a game. So, if you're on Fortnite or Roblox, you're not gonna know which skins are popular in that game. Gamers are looking for something that will enhance their experience in gaming. So this is something that's super important. And this will also lead us— once you have that mindset of how to think like an entrepreneur, you can take that and translate it and make sure that your branding works as well. So let's take a look at branding in the metaverse. The number one thing to consider is authenticity is key. Because if something is presented to your consumers that is not authentic, that does not look like your brand, they're not going to buy into that. If they look at something that's too contrived, they're going to think, what is this? I don't recognize that. So it has to be— it has to translate across metaverses. So if you have something on your laptop, you're designing something on your laptop, that image has to translate onto your website, same image. And it has to translate across in gaming, across into Decentraland, even in your video calls. You all have to have a same kind of similar image so your customers can recognize you. Like, for example, in Other Stories, they have a very simple cut of their clothes, and they have that Scandinavian style, it's very distinct. Your consumers are gonna be able to tell, "Oh yes, this is an Other Stories. I can recognize them in a sandbox just because of how that image is presented to me." And let's also consider the future of metaverses out there and how you are going to brand yourself in these metaverses. For example, if you plop down $100,000 on a store in one metaverse, What happens? And lo and behold, this is going to happen as we're talking right now. There are people working on all these other metaverses that are going to come out, that are going to be more sophisticated, offer more amenities, and offer something that probably we haven't even considered right now that's going to be super exciting. And we're going to have all these celebrities, these A-listers, these public, public people are going to be hopping over to these metaverses. So what happens to your brand when you're stuck in this one metaverse? So you have to consider the future of where you're going to be positioned. OK, so let's go on to talking about branding right here. Does anybody know this image? Where is this from? [SPEAKING CHINESE] Yes, this was released last week. This is a Facebook— Facebook has done a collaboration with some luxury brands. And any first impressions on what you think about the authenticity of these brands? What are your takes on it? Would you buy any of this stuff on here? What's that? I said in real life, not in Meta. Right, I mean, if I were to look at it, those two gray items, those people wearing those two things, if I were to just look at it offhand, I'd think, OK, is Delta Airlines getting into fashion now? Are they zhushing up their uniforms? And then the far left one, is Buzz Lightyear going pret-a-porter now? Is that his deal? And the woman in the right with the skirt, I definitely recognize this. Because you know how I saw my neighbor wearing that same outfit last night when she was taking out the recycling. That's how I know. That's how I know. So now when we see something like this and how it's a little bit confusing to some people, we need to think about how the process works. And let's see if we can fix the process. So in this volatile space landscape that we are in right now, we have to reconsider about how and if we're still continue with NFTs. Are we still going to continue with them? Are they dead or not? And if so, if we still want to do NFTs, how many should we do now if people are slowing down buying them? Should we do one-offs or should we do like a few? How many copies are we going to make of them? Where are we going to sell them? What are the prices? What are the margins? Should we reduce our prices or should we make them more expensive and create some sort of scarcity? Where are we going to sell them? Are we going to go on different platforms, or should we do something different and put them on our own platform? And will our consumers want to buy them? Will they understand, OK, I'm going to go to your store's platform and buy them? Will they— under your traditional buyers, will they understand that? And because the metaverse is moving so fast, we also need to consider the time that is taken to create these NFTs. Maybe we need to slow down on the revisions because the number of revisions that you do in creating a 3D wearable is— that's costing money. And then obviously interoperability is so important. People are going to want more utility, more value in NFTs than ever now. And they definitely want to— definitely want to be able to hop around different metaverses, different realms. Maybe they want to get some discounts or something on these NFTs. These are super, super important to think about. Also, what are these little NFTs— if you're creating wearables, what do they look like on avatars? And I don't know about you guys, but for me, I'm kind of getting bored of the cartoony avatars. Can we please make— is there anybody that shares the same opinion as me? Can we please make avatars a little more sophisticated or sexy? Is that possible? And let's also think about if we're going to apply AR on these wearables, because that's what really brings these NFTs to life. And if we can roll the video, I would just like to show you something that my company has been working on. These are part of a digital zodiac collection, 12-piece collection of zodiac earrings, so 12 months, 12 zodiac signs. And as you can see here, we did the AR, and the movement is great because As I move my head, the earrings move with it, and they have a nice angle. And as you can see, the chains move with it too. And we started this design process— yeah, there's me covering my face, so you can see the AR is gone once I cover my face, just like that. We start the process by just— it was quite simple— by getting some trims, physical trims, cutting them up, what we had in the studio, and then taking pictures of them. So all different angles, and then sending them to our 3D renderer, who then put it all together. So when you have everything all together, this is the finished product. So I'd just like to conclude that the future of fashion has never been brighter. Let's celebrate what the future holds for technology in fashion, and that the impossible is possible in the metaverse. Let's continue to be brave, to be bold, to innovate and lead. We are all pioneers in this exciting new space, and we are all creating history as digital designers, as phygital fashion brands in Web3. And that, my friends, is a remarkable achievement. Thank you very much. My name again is Tracey Greenan. Please connect with me on LinkedIn. I'm also free to talk to as well. Come down and say hello. I'm always open to exploring new ideas and possible collaborations and partnerships. Let's do some Q&A. Anybody got some questions out there? Don't be shy. It's okay. Yes. Hi, I'm Heidi from Carhartt. Just wondering what 3D technology you use. Who's your rendering partner? Right, so we use Blender. Yeah. And we use some freelancers. And the freelancers that we use, it's quite tricky because they're all working for our competitors. And our biggest challenge is getting them to find the— to squeeze us in. It's really, really difficult. And it seems like there's just so few people doing what we're doing because the rendering they're doing is on hard surfaces. So compared to soft surfaces, it's completely a different field. You've got, like, for example, this crystal that I'm wearing. You've got translucency. So you have different angles of different shapes. You have iridescence to think about. And then also, if— If it's gold, there's different colors to gold, like 14-karat looks very different than 24-karat. Anything else? Yes. Hi, Tracy. So could you tell us a little more from a personal point of view about the challenges? So I don't know if there's other designers in the house, but knowing about the challenges that you've overcome, I think it's a really good way of learning about everything. Yeah, good question. Moving from, sorry, from physical to digital. Yeah, well, when I first got into, I heard about digital fashion last year and I thought, okay, this is great, I really need to get into this. And then I just got distracted with everyday business and then I got called on to do a talk on Clubhouse with a Paris avant-garde digital fashion brand called Ultraraj and a digital accessories platform called Jevils. And you might see there, I've left their badges on the chairs. They're a great brand, great group of people in Austria. And I thought, OK, I really need to get into this. And I just asked them, let's collaborate. Let's do something. So we came up with the Metaverse Starter Set for Style Lovers. And it's a fidgetal fashion set that you have the earrings physical earrings and physical necklace to wear in real life, as well as digital twin NFTs to wear online on your Zoom calls, on your video calls, in gaming, and across metaverses. And we're lucky enough to be mentioned in The New York Times for this kit. Yes, hi. Yes, thank you. That was very inspirational. Just a quick question. When you're considering the types of metaverse platforms to actually show your items on, what do you consider? Well, you need to look at who else is on there. So you want to see who your competitors are, who's on there, how many people are on there, what the demographics are, who's talking about it. And see what those metaverses have to offer, what kind of fun events are going on there, who's already in there, what brands are in there. No math questions, please. No math questions. Jackson from Boldmetrics. Just curious your thoughts on expression in the metaverse. And how that's kind of affecting product creation. There's like aspects of digital twins where you're representing yourself as you would in real life, people being more expressive in the metaverse. Just your thoughts on that. Yeah, great question. Great question. So the jewelry that I create, I love the most is the AR effect to them. So I actually love having the filter more than the NFT because it's just so fun to wear and to express myself when I'm on on these video calls. I'm on video calls every day. I mean, are we all on video calls a lot? It's so much fun to wear them because there's just a little bit of nuance in these NFTs that we're making. So it's not until, you know, you can wear them in a proper business meeting, you can wear them with your friends because there's nothing too crazy about them. It's not until like maybe you're like, you know, deep into your meeting with like some friends or something that they're just kind of wondering, what is that she's got on? So it's something that's a nice conversation piece as well. But also, it is a great and wonderful way to express yourselves in metaverses. You can, like, as, you know, the Fabricant said, you can wear fire, you can wear a jacket made out of water. Your imagination is unlimited in the metaverse. And the great thing about it is that we're just getting started. Anybody else? No? Well, thank you very much for coming out. I appreciate your support. And please feel free to connect with me on LinkedIn and come up and say hello. I'd like to chat. Thank you. Thank you so much.