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How AI is helping shoppers find dupes for less
Do you have dreams of buying expensive fashion, furniture, or housewares, but a smaller budget in reality? Many consumers are turning to "dupes" for less.
HOUSTON - Do you have dreams of buying expensive fashion, furniture, or housewares, but a smaller budget in reality?
Many consumers are turning to "dupes" for less.
We're not talking knock-offs or counterfeit items. A dupe is defined as a product with the same look or function as a high-end good, but with a lower price point.
"I fell for a furniture price scam, and I built something to fight back," explained Bobby Ghoshal on TikTok when he launched Dupe.com.
By the numbers:
Dupe.com uses AI to help shoppers find dupes for furniture, fashion, jewelry and home goods.
"It’s the fastest way to get the vibe, the look, and pay significantly less. People are spending between 50% and 60%, 70% less on purchases," said Ghoshal.
You can simply enter a link to a product, or upload a photo of an item you want.
"A lot of stuff online is white labeled, which means the same few factories are all making the products. These brands buy products without a label on them. They slap a new name and a price on it," explained Ghoshal.
We tried it out:
We asked our morning team what they wanted to buy. DaLaun wanted Gucci sneakers that sell for $950. Dupe showed us a secondhand pair on eBay for $335, and a similar Gucci sneaker on Overstock for $550.
And Mike wants a $3,000 dollar electric guitar. Dupe found the same one for $2,000.
But in a world full of knockoffs and counterfeits, we asked Goshal how they protect shoppers from buying fakes. He says the blue check mark indicates verified sellers on their site, and they encourage shoppers to buy from retailers they know and trust.
"Duping a look is very different from counterfeiting products. We don’t show counterfeit products on Dupe. There are massive counterfeit sites that millions of American shoppers visit every month that have been blacklisted on our site," said Ghoshal.
More ways to save
Dig deeper:
Goshal says shoppers can even simply describe what they're looking for.
"And say something like I need active noise-canceling headphones with surround sound," he suggested.
Dupe can do the research for you.
"We will make sense of that and synthesize the tens of millions of data points, download, and review the videos ourselves, and give you a full report on the ten products we recommend," Ghoshal said.
A few other apps can also help shoppers find certain dupe products, including Spoken.io, Dupeshop and SkinSkool, which focus on beauty products.
The Source: Information in this article is from Dupe.com and out interview with CEO Bobby Ghoshal.