David's Bridal Partners with Perksy Following Win in 'Future of Retail' Competition

David's Bridal, the nation's leading bridal retailer, is evolving not amid but in spite of the global pandemic. In fact, it's reimagining wedding preparation through a bold digital transformation that has included innovating to meet the needs of their consumers through virtual and online solutions. As part of this digital transformation, David's Bridal has announced a partnership with on-demand consumer insights platform Perksy after participating in a competition curated by Havas New York, a full-service creative and media agency, and NYC Media Lab, an organisation that connects digital media and technology companies with NYC universities to drive innovation, entrepreneurship and talent development. 

"We jumped at the chance to be a part of a program that invests, rewards, and empowers startups that are on the forefront of retail innovation," said Kelly Cook, chief marketing and IT officer of David's Bridal. "We went into this competition knowing we wanted to award a grand prize to the winner. But after seeing the presentations from all of these teams, we were blown away and expanded our offering to grant all of the teams cash prizes and the opportunity to test their solutions with David's. I'm all about numbers and analytics, and I can already tell our upcoming collaboration with winner Perksy will be incredibly insightful and rewarding."

The Havas New York and NYC Media Lab program, known as the Lean Venture Studio, brought together early-to-mid-level startups with the best disruptive minds to help reignite retail. The challenge provided these companies a curriculum and resources to develop products that aim to shape new and unique customer experiences and solutions in the retail industry. The startups and their innovations featured were:

- Perksy: an on-demand insights platform that powers contextual, in-the-moment research with everyday people through an interactive and gamified mobile app that rewards users for answering brand questions

- Proneer: an omnichannel hardware and software personalisation platform, seamlessly integrated to enhance beauty retail experience

- The Call List: the first-ever interactive video plug-in for e-commerce, powering shoppable video calls from influencers to your brand's entire community

- Drops: a social AR platform that allows anyone to drop and collect music, messages, or 3D content

David's Bridal selected Perksy as the winner of a grant and the opportunity to pilot a program to enhance its own consumer experience. The company will use Perksy's solutions to continue its digital transformation. David's Bridal also awarded each remaining startup a partial grant for participating in the competition.

"We're thrilled to collaborate with an iconic retailer like David's Bridal," said Nadia Masri, founder and CEO of Perksy. "Weddings are being reimagined in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic, and brands understand they must adapt and innovate to meet the needs of their consumers. By leveraging the qualitative research capabilities built in the Havas Retail Accelerator Program, we can connect deeply with brides as they navigate today's unprecedented choices leading up to their big day."

What makes this program unique is its approach, bringing together a hybrid agency team of media, creative, business strategy, and analytics experts for education, inspiration and mentorship. In return for gaining academic perspectives, research and access to entrepreneurs shaking up key industries, Havas New York offered grant funding, mentorship and network access to support the next wave of tech-focused talent throughout the duration of the program.

"It's a partnership program that explores future-facing concepts, experiments with cutting-edge emerging technologies, and creates new opportunities that strengthen the City's innovation community." said Erica Matsumoto, NYC Media Lab's director of partnerships and new initiatives.

James Huerta, Havas North America director of emerging technology concluded: "Through the Lean Venture Studio for Retail, we're moving retail forward by fostering the creation of products and solutions designed to help modernise customers' retail experiences and infuse new meaning throughout an in-store and online experience."