How Virtual Retail Is Transforming Data, Store Design, Visual Merchandising, Wholesale Sell-In & Sustainability at Scale

Retail is a huge global industry, yet much of its decision-making still happens in the dark. Product assortments, merchandising strategies, and store designs are often locked in months before they are tested with consumers. Changes made after implementation cost up to twenty times more than adjustments made in the design stage, yet brands have had little choice but to rely on costly physical samples, store mockups, and trial-and-error rollouts.

“It struck me that retailers were making multi-million-dollar decisions without the tools to predict outcomes,” says Martin Allen, founder and CEO of Virtual Retail. “They were locked into a build-then-test model that wasted resources, slowed creativity, and created unnecessary risk.”

Virtual Retail emerged to break that cycle. Allen, who previously ran a successful property visualisation business, saw the inefficiency firsthand when working with global retailers. They wanted images and fly-throughs of new store layouts, but lacked the integrated data or digital tools to create and make sense of them. “The information was fragmented, there were many duplicate tools with conflicting silos of data, the workflows were manual, and there was no platform that brought it all together in one single source of truth,” Allen recalls. “That was the challenge we set out to solve.”

The result is a proprietary digital twin platform that allows retailers to design, test, and validate complete store environments in real time. Unlike traditional workflows that can stretch four to six months, Virtual Retail’s process compresses that cycle to just two or three months. Instead of creating thousands of physical samples and shipping them worldwide for review, brands upload digital assets into Virtual Retail’s platform, build a virtual store including visual merchandising, and collaborate remotely to test multiple scenarios.

“The difference is night and day,” Allen explains. “Traditional processes involve months of shipping, travel, and rebuilding. Our clients can test unlimited scenarios at a fraction of the cost, collaborate remotely, and make data-driven decisions before a single product is manufactured or a fixture is built.”

At the core of this capability is an enterprise-grade rendering engine that processes tens of thousands of 3D products in real time. Advanced automation handles tasks like folding, hanging, and optimising assets for scale, while intelligent merchandising rules ensure accuracy across thousands of SKUs. Cross-platform integration allows teams to collaborate seamlessly, whether in VR, on desktop, in digital showrooms, or in the cloud.

The platform also embeds AI and machine learning. Automated image masking and tagging streamline workflows, while eye-tracking analytics and pattern recognition from user behaviour generate actionable insights. “We are bringing the same intelligence that drives e-commerce analytics into the physical retail world,” Allen says. “For the first time, brands can measure consumer response before committing millions to production.”

This is not just about efficiency, it’s also about creativity. Designers, who once spent most of their time managing admin and approvals, can now focus on design exploration. With the platform generating instant exports and enabling A/B testing, they have the freedom to present multiple concepts and push creative boundaries. “When you can fail for free, people are willing to take risks,” Allen says. “That’s when you see design innovation come to life.”

The sustainability benefits are equally significant. By replacing thousands of physical samples with digital ones, companies can reduce waste and cut carbon emissions from global shipping. Only products that buyers commit to are manufactured, minimising overproduction and landfill. “You only make what you know is going to sell,” Allen explains. “It’s better for business and better for the planet.”

Virtual Retail’s traction to date has been a remarkable client retention rate achieved entirely through referrals. But Allen emphasises that the company is just getting started. With the platform proven at enterprise scale, Virtual Retail is opening a new funding round at the end of 2025. This initiative will be used to fuel a strategic growth phase that includes its next evolution: AI:ME, the first AI-powered virtual try-on solution capable of handling complete, multi-layered outfits.

“Online fashion still suffers from 30 to 50 percent return rates because shoppers can’t visualise full outfits accurately,” Allen says. “AI:ME solves that by letting customers build and see complete looks in real time. It reduces returns, increases basket size, and integrates directly into retailers’ websites.”

Unlike limited solutions from tech giants, AI:ME leverages Virtual Retail’s massive library of 3D apparel assets and its proprietary rendering infrastructure. It’s a natural expansion from store visualisation into consumer experience, and early prototypes have already attracted interest from enterprise clients.

For Allen, this progression reflects the company’s core mission: helping retailers make smarter, faster, and more sustainable decisions with technology. “We started with the idea of giving brands confidence in their store designs, which then evolved to encapsulate visual merchandising and wholesale sell-in,” he says. “Now we are extending that confidence all the way to the consumer, where the decisions are ultimately made.”

In an industry still transitioning from analogue to digital-first design, Virtual Retail represents more than just another tool. It is a platform that redefines how ideas become reality, saving money, empowering designers, and helping the planet.

Allen says, “Virtual Retail is about unlocking value that was always there but never visible. We are making the invisible measurable, and the measurable actionable.”