IKEA Introduces Generative AI Shopping Assistant in the OpenAI GPT Store
Shop with ChatGPT and move right through to shopping cart checkout
IKEA has introduced a generative AI shopping assistant for ChatGPT in OpenAI’s GPT store. The GPT will help shoppers find and research products and even identify furniture from uploaded photos. When asked about its capabilities, the GPT responded.
As the IKEA U.S. GPT, I specialize in helping you with a variety of tasks related to shopping and product discovery at IKEA in the United States. Here's what I can do for you:
Product Search: I can assist in finding specific IKEA products based on your requests. Whether you're looking for furniture, home accessories, or specific categories like new releases or top sellers, I can help you find what you're looking for.
Product Availability Checks: I can check the availability of a product for home delivery or in-store pickup. Just provide me with your ZIP code or the nearest IKEA store, and I'll take care of the rest.
Checkout Links Creation: If you decide on a product, I can create a checkout link for you, making your shopping experience smoother.
IKEA Content Search: Looking for ideas, tips, or how-to guides related to home furnishing? I can find relevant IKEA-published content to inspire and assist you.
Store Information: Need information about an IKEA store in the U.S.? I can provide details about store locations, opening hours, and more.
Image Recognition: If you have an image of a home furnishing item and you're not sure if it's from IKEA, I can help identify it.
Image Creation: I can generate images related to home furnishing room designs in IKEA style, perfect for visualization and inspiration.
Feel free to ask me anything related to IKEA's products and services in the U.S.!
Generative Commerce?
Consider this: most retailers don’t cover all of these features in their existing mobile apps or websites. IKEA has enabled the capabilities through ChatGPT, an application used by more than 100 million weekly active users.
Even more interesting is that IKEA is integrating the experience into its operational systems. You would not be surprised if a GPT had access to an IKEA furniture catalog. This could be added to a static or batch-updated database fairly easily. However, IKEA’s GPT is checking on product availability. This requires access to the company’s inventory system and available-to-promise stock. It also creates a shopping cart link to speed up the check-out process for users. This must tap into the e-commerce order management system.
This represents an evolution of “conversational commerce” (h/t Chris Messina) for the generative AI era. It also demonstrates that generative AI can tap into systems of record that drive operational processes and is not restricted to hitting knowledge bases.
So, how does IKEA do this in the ChatGPT ecosystem? A good guess would be the Assistants API and function called. However, it shows the GPT connecting to IKEA systems via a ChatGPT plugin. I assume this means they are simply using the functionality originally developed for ChatGPT plugins before OpenAI shifted to the GPTs model. This may be one reason why Microsoft has expressed an intent to maintain the plugins model even if it is deprecated by OpenAI.
An Experiment
It is clear that the Ingka Group of IKEA stores sees this as an experiment rather than a key generative AI commerce strategy. Parag Parekh, Global Chief Digital Officer (CDO) for IKEA Retail (Ingka Group), commented in a prepared release:
The new IKEA AI Assistant on GPT Stores is an ongoing initiative, and the continuation of a journey that looks to enrich the retail experience and explore additional avenues to interact with our customers and coworkers, as they help us improve and develop further.
Francesco Marzoni, Chief Data & Analytics Officer (CDAO), added:
We are taking a pragmatic, execution-focused approach, learning by doing and capitalizing on our early efforts of a Responsible AI framework. We activated a broad ecosystem of partners to bring to life several experiments, so that we can take part in the AI evolution as we shape our company strategy.
Still, IKEA is not the first company to experiment with shopping assistants or conversational commerce. This will be a good test case to see if ChatGPT’s audience or IKEA shoppers are enticed to engage in a new form of shopping outside traditional web and mobile app destinations.
