Animal Crossing X Fashion
Animal Crossing avatars
Nintendo’s Animal Crossing: New Horizons has become a fashion meeting place for fashion designers, brands, photographers, and consumers stuck at home during the quarantine. The virtual life simulation game that focuses on avatar creation, is now a trendy melting pot for virtual editorial shoots, launch parties for new collections, and brand promotion. With over 5 million copies sold, Animal Crossing has given fashion creatives a chance to market brands and new designs for free. While the trend boosts brand awareness and PR, the question remains whether it will be able to bring in sales for brands.
In the game, players can create customized clothes for their avatars by importing images or designing them per pixel. So, as people are not dressing up to leave home, they are dressing up their avatars as “coronavirus therapy”. The popularity of the practice by fashion lovers across the world has led to the creation of Instagram accounts like Nook Street Market, Animal Crossing Fashion Archive, and Crossing the Runway, that share virtual outfits and QR codes for players to use. Looks from Yeezy, Alexander McQueen, Off-White, Louis Vuitton, and many more high-end brands are being shared as a way for people to show off their daily outfits.
Collaborations between fashion and gaming have been a rising trend since 2019. Before Animal Crossing, there were collaborations between Moschino and the Sims, Nike, and Fortnite, Louis Vuitton, and League of Legends to name a few. Brands created special products for users to have virtually, which led to more store traffic and sales. However, the difference is that Animal Crossing fashion is created by users and not by big brands – and everything is free. Brands cannot buy product placement or ads in the game, making Animal Crossing purely a platform for brand exposure and PR. Players can learn about brands, their products, and even virtually wear their designs without purchasing anything.
The trend has posed a threat to brands, as anyone can just splat a monogram onto a garment and ruin product image or brand consistency and authenticity without brands gaining any profit. However, some designers have decided to take advantage of how their consumers are using Animal Crossing by hosting virtual pop-up stores or creating digitally exclusive designs. For example, New York-based designer Sandy Liang hosted a pop-up, welcoming players into her island to take some of her garment designs was able to keep in touch with fans, and spread awareness about her designs through the event and the release of her digital lookbook. Streetwear designer Julian Consuegra on the other hand digitally recreated some of his best-selling garments for Animal Crossing. These designers have found a way to digitally engage with consumers, positively impacting their brand image and consumer loyalty.
Although clothing on Animal Crossing is free, some brands like Happy99 believe that digital garments may have a connection with increasing sales. As their consumers have become aware of their brand through the game, Happy99 saw a 30% increase in sales. This signals a great opportunity for brands– Animal Crossing could be a new marketing and PR tool yet to be utilized to drive sales. For brand buyers, in turn, the game could give them invaluable consumer and market research that could influence their trend forecasts and buying plans for after the pandemic. It may be an opportunity for brands to look into what designs their consumers are looking for or will look for in the future. It may also give brands insight into the consumers of their competitors and how they can market to them too. Even if what players are downloading now may not directly bring in a profit, it can influence decisions made by consumers when they are actually shopping online. Brand presence on Animal Crossing is a way for fashion brands to remain relevant during the imposition of quarantine.
The consumer-instigated Animal Crossing X Fashion collaboration is only beginning to develop. Though brands cannot sell garments online, it is a possibility that Nintendo may enter into collaboration talks with brands to avoid lawsuits or even accelerate profit. The future of fashion’s presence in Animal Crossing may just open up product selling opportunities that buyers should already consider. Animal Crossing could be a new distribution channel for digital garments that can cater to loyal consumers who play the game. However, in the meantime, Animal Crossing as a fashion meeting place should not be ignored by brands or buyers as it is a valuable marketing and consumer research opportunity.
