More Americans offer prized data: body measurements

The first step for a shopper buying a suit at the fast-growing menswear retailer Indochino is sharing his personal information: A salesperson armed with an iPad measures nearly everything on his body, from the distance between his belly button and rear to the circumference of his knees.

The next step is getting a customized, made-to-measure suit delivered to his home within a few weeks. But his body data lives on: Company executives are hoping to build a “master data model” that would connect his measurements with his advertising, shopping and spending histories.

Clothing companies now see body measurements as one of their most prized currencies, and millions of Americans are increasingly offering up their innermost personal data in search of customized pieces or a better fit.

Companies such as Indochino, Wantable and Stitch Fix, the latter of which counted nearly $1 billion in sales last year, gather dozens of data points on each customer, including weight, jobs and past pregnancies. They are being joined by Amazon.com, the online-retail giant that counts fashion among its fastest-growing businesses and now sells a bedroom camera that offers opinions on what a user wears.

But the corporate harvest of data about our bodies, including our faces, voices and fingerprints, also is raising privacy concerns about how much sharing is too much in service of better-fitting clothes.

“These body measurements look a lot like medical records,” said Peter Swire, a law professor at the Georgia Tech Scheller College of Business who coordinated with the White House in the 1990s during the shaping of the nation’s medical privacy law.

Those health privacy rules, Swire said, “would apply to this data if the measurements were taken at the hospital. It doesn’t apply when an online company puts them in an app.”

Clothing profile

Companies value this data because it can lock customers in for life and make it easy to order customized clothes over the internet without trying anything on. But some privacy experts question whether Americans have a clear idea of what they are handing over.

“There’s a little bit of a weirdness about it. You’re letting people into your life,” said Autumn Rocha, a 26-year-old student in Baltimore and Stitch Fix client. “But there’s also something cool about it: ‘This is what I’m into. What can you find for me?’”

A new Stitch Fix customer fills out a profile that compiles up to 85 data points. A woman is asked if she is a mother or currently pregnant, as well as her due date. She also hands over her dress, waist and bra size; her age, job and location; parts of the body she would like to flaunt or downplay; and answers to more-abstract questions, such as whether she likes taking risks.

Algorithms use that data to pick through Stitch Fix’s inventory, referring options to a human “stylist” who decides on which to send. The customer pays to keep the clothes she likes and can send back anything she doesn’t. She can’t, however, go on the site and pick things out; her only choice is what the algorithms recommend.

The company says it can better assess style by having access to customers’ Pinterest and Instagram accounts, which many customers willingly share. Company executives said others go a step further, sharing details of life milestones — new jobs, recent divorces, upcoming vacations and funerals — to define the clothes they are looking for.

Stitch Fix chief algorithms officer Eric Colson said he was surprised at how quickly customers were willing to share so much about themselves. At Netflix, where he previously led data science and engineering, the streaming-video service pushed to keep new users interested by removing as many questions at sign-up as possible. But at Stitch Fix, where building a profile can involve answering more than 80 personal questions, the follow-through rate is one of the highest Colson said he has ever seen.

“People love to fill out that questionnaire,” he said.

‘Client journey’

Stitch Fix refers to its data-gathering in the terms of a lifelong relationship: Customers go on a “client journey,” and the company pledges to be a “partner for life.” In a presentation to investors in November, Stitch Fix outlined the spending history of a 36-year-old Indiana doctor whom, through switches to maternity wear, they could track through three pregnancies.

The company distinguishes itself to investors by saying it has rich, high-quality data provided directly by the client rather than taken from other sources. Customers are “motivated” to share as much personal detail as possible, the company said in financial filings late last year, “because they recognize that doing so will result in more personalized and successful experiences.”

The technology has helped the company achieve incredible growth. Its more than 2 million active clients drove nearly $1 billion in sales last year, more than 10 times the company’s revenue in 2014. The company has in a few years become one of the biggest online clothes sellers in the United States, with sales last year that rivaled department store giant J.C. Penney, according to data from market researcher Euromonitor.

Executives say this level of data has helped them gain ground in parts of middle America where fashion options are limited. Stitch Fix also says the data has helped it capture an underserved market of American women by offering styles and sizes they might not find in their local department store.