UNIQLO invented a new way to buy T-shirts: Choose not the designs, but the person who picks for you.

The retail model features a subscription system where each of the 30 influential Pickstars curates on the users' behalf five T-shirts from a selection of 1,200 designs. This way, shoppers are freed from the tedious and time-consuming task of having to browse through the designs and decide what to buy.

This approach was possible with UT being a brand that boasted quality and quantity.

We displayed 1,200 UT T-shirts at a studio, and invited each Pickstar to spend three hours on average to choose five T-shirts. The lineup of Pickstars ranged from models, stylists, bloggers, to novelists and dancers.

Along with gaining publicity through the announcement of this new service, we generated more buzz by making available on YouTube documentary videos of the T-shirt selection process. This helped users understand the variety and high quality of the T-shirts, and enjoy a positive experience of the UT brand story --- That UT offers T-shirts adored by people of a variety of tastes and aesthetics.

Each month, a curated T-shirt would arrive along with a message card with fashion tips from the Pickstar. Users of the UT Picks service would not know the T-shirt design until upon receiving it. The surprise element encouraged users to post about UT on social media each time their T-shirt arrived.

The announcement of the service launch immediately caught the attention of the media and the public, and generated publicity with an advertising value equivalency of 500 million JPY (4.45 million USD).

During the first week after the service launched, over 15,000 UT T-shirts were sold, including several Pickstars' selections being sold out.

UT Picks not only cleared the public misconception of the brand, but led to an increase of UNIQLO's e-commerce sales --- 10.5 billion JPY (89 million USD), a 40.6% increase from the previous year.

Our mission was to communicate to users the high quality and rich variation of UNIQLO's graphic T-shirt brand, UT, and encourage purchases. To achieve this, instead of an one-off campaign, we developed a new online service.

"UT Picks," a subscription service for purchasing T-shirts curated by influential individuals of various cultures and genres, generated a 140.6% increase from the year before for UNIQLO's e-commerce sales. This new service attracted the public's attention, and stimulated the sales of UT T-shirts.

According to UNIQLO’s original research, 80% of users feel choosing clothes on their own is troublesome, and approximately 45% of users wish for trustworthy advice when shopping for clothes.

Having Pickstars of various cultures and genres each selecting five must-wear T-shirts releases users from the burden of having to choose by themselves, and allows them to enjoy recommendations of individuals they trust.

The development of a new retail model led to increased publicity not only online, but reached the masses via the media.

Moreover, by making public documentary videos of Pickstars actually selecting T-shirts, we were able to visually communicate the richness of UT designs.

UT is the graphic T-shirt brand by UNIQLO. It collaborates with over 40 brands and content creators, and sells more than 1,200 designs.

However, sales fluctuate depending on the collaboration, and UT faced difficulties in cultivating loyalty among users. With the large number of T-shirts to choose from, many users felt the shopping process to be tedious and time-consuming.

Furthermore, the fact that each T-shirt design has a different cut, material and graphic, was not being effectively communicated to the general public. Up until now, many users have been misunderstanding that UT offers only one type of T-shirt that features various graphics.

Our mission was to communicate to users the unique qualities of UT and increase the sales of UT T-shirts.