Future of experiential shopping: How to connect with customers in an AI saturated world

itmummomin
Sep 25
5 min read

September 23, 2025 | Personalized Shopping Experiences | Retail Innovation | AI | By Itmum Momin

The Future of Retail: Experience, Personalization & AI — Rebalancing retail for a future built on experience, personalization, and intelligence.

The present and the future of experiential shopping

Retail is undergoing its most significant reinvention since the advent of the department store. Rising customer expectations, rapid advancements in technology and blurring lines between physical and digital commerce have created a challenge as well as an opportunity for retailers to transform their business.

To explore these dynamics further, we recently hosted our “State of Retail and Emerging Trends” podcast with two industry leaders. Ms. Rabbiya Hussain, a global retail executive with experience at Adidas and Lululemon, and Mr. Samrat Biswas, a seasoned digital transformation leader who has spearheaded omni-channel innovation at Aeropostale, Brooks Brothers, Eddie Bauer, and more, joined us to share their perspectives on where the industry is heading.

Experience as the new anchor

Historically, the retail equation was simple: Product + Price = Growth. But with infinite choice just a click away, that formula no longer holds. The consumer relationship is no longer transactional, it is experiential.

Stores are no longer shelves stacked with goods. They are stages where brands share their story and invite customers to participate.

As Rabbiya mentioned: “consumers are looking for experiences and you want shopping to feel like it's a part of your lifestyle and your pastime. So going into stores… is not so much about big consumer acquisitions, it's more about a branded feel… your brand becomes a destination… drives more community and more conversation.”

Uniqlo, for example, is expanding worldwide but ensures each store feels local by partnering with designers and influencers in every market. Others are blending retail with cafés, workshops, or cultural events.

Reimagining loyalty

Loyalty, previously measured in points and promotions, is changing. Today customers expect brands to anticipate their needs, reward them for purchases, and treat them as individuals.

Samrat reframed this shift on our podcast: “The conversation needs to shift from asking if the customer is loyal to the brand, to asking if the brand is loyal to the customer.”

Rabbiya echoed this sentiment mentioning Adidas’ AdiClub. By offering experiences like event access, wellness partnerships, and exclusive collaborations, it created a sense of belonging. Members engaged more deeply and delivered more than 2.5x the lifetime value of non-members.

The future of experiential shopping and personalization is shifting from transactions to conversations and relationships. In practice, it looks less like a loyalty card and more like a friendship: give, take, and mutual commitment.

Moving beyond treating AI as a plug-in

AI dominates retail headlines, but too often it is treated as a shiny dashboard feature or a bolt-on. This is impressive but superficial. AI is not the ornament; it is the engine under the hood. Invisible to the customer but powering every mile of their journey.

As Samrat warned: “If you don’t integrate with your own data and clean semantic models, you won’t get value out of AI.”

Where the engine drives value:

Agentic shopping assistants anticipating preferences and purchases.
Virtual try-on tools reducing returns while boosting confidence.
Personalization engines that dynamically adjust websites, promotions, and even store layouts.
Operational intelligence optimizing inventory, pricing, and logistics to keep promises made at the front end.

What can industry participants do?

The trends in the retail industry create an opportunity for organizations to leapfrog their competition. We recommend 5 pillars as companies chart their path in this new landscape:

Remember the basics: The quality and price of products remain essential.

“…the fundamentals of retail… haven’t really changed that much. The fundamentals… is the product really strong? Is the quality really there? Do I have it at the right price point…?” - Rabbiya Hussain, VP - Enterprise Strategy & Business Transformation, lululemon.

Focus on transparency and trust: Trust is the new currency. Technology and AI open several possibilities such as dynamic pricing. However, transparency is paramount because the key is not whether consumers are manipulated, but rather if they feel that they have been cheated.

As Rabbiya cautioned: “Dynamic pricing as it comes out, if it's not disclosed, if it's not managed, if it's not governed… it' is going to have an impact on credibility and trust.”

Reimagine loyalty: Move beyond discounts and basic loyalty programs to membership ecosystems that create reciprocity. Try to prove to your customers that you are loyal to them by giving them experiences they value.

Rabbiya mentions that the West can learn from the East in this regard. "Things like live streaming eventually will move West. The point system that companies like Shein will have eventually will bleed into membership and loyalty in North American or European countries or companies."

Invest in AI with purpose: Avoid “pilot purgatory”. Treat AI as the engine, not the ornament or an add-on.

“What I’m seeing more and more is what I call the whole pilot purgatory, and the reason for that is people are doing AI as cherry on top... not as a fundamental shift of how you do business and how you automate your entire process.” - Samrat Biswas, VP, Product and GTM Strategy, Commerce and Retail Cloud, Salesforce.

Shape the organization, not just the technology: Upskill leaders, empower teams, and embed agile, cross-functional ways of working.

Rabbiya further echoed the sentiment mentioning “AI is only as strong of a tool as the capability of the leadership's understanding… if you don't know how to wield that tool, it's just gonna sit in your garage and not really have that much of an impact.”

Looking ahead: 2028 and beyond

Moving forward, the fundamentals of having strong products at fair prices will endure. What is changing is the delivery of the product, whether it is through Agentic AI or Experiential flagships. But in an AI saturated world, authenticity and trust have become the key differentiators.

As Rabbiya concluded: “If you don’t have a great relationship with your consumer and you aren’t listening to them and if you don’t have great product… at the end of the day… it’s not going to work…"

Gravitas: our perspective

Rather than chasing every trend, we envision the industry reinventing itself by marrying the fundamentals with modern intelligence. AI is more than a tool, it is a bridge that can connect operational excellence with customer loyalty, thereby driving growth.

Gravitas is working as a partner to help leaders reimagine retail by deploying intelligent insights faster and targeting specific high-impact AI use cases. Together, we are shaping a future of retail that is as human as it is intelligent.

About Us

At Gravitas, we help leaders drive outcomes that matter. We partner with CxOs and PE Operating Partners to turn strategy into measurable results, from vision through execution. Our focus areas include transformation, analytics, and CIO advisory, with deep expertise in the Retail, CPG, and QSR industries.

What sets us apart: Laminar™ Strategy Execution Platform: our proprietary tool that gives executives real-time visibility into priorities, KPIs, and initiatives. Activation Office & Change Discipline: governance, adoption playbooks, and executive-ready dashboards that ensure transformations stick.

Industry Depth: 15+ years advising brands like lululemon, Ralph Lauren, Estée Lauder, Williams-Sonoma, Wegmans, Subway, and Blaze Pizza.

Shared Accountability: a portion of our fees tied to client success.

Our impact speaks for itself: