Why Levi's turned a hackathon idea into an AI tool for store employees to make denim shopping easier.

The article focuses on Levi Strauss & Co.'s integration of generative artificial intelligence (AI) across its retail and operational processes, led by Chief Digital and Technology Officer Jason Gowans. Levi's developed "STITCH," an AI assistant powered by Google Cloud's Gemini large language models, which helps store associates with product knowledge and customer service, resulting in improved consumer satisfaction. The company is expanding AI use beyond retail support to areas such as product design, demand forecasting, price optimization, and automating order processing from smaller retailers. Levi's is also piloting a "super agent" within Microsoft Teams to streamline employee access to information and actions across various business functions. Additionally, Levi's is exploring AI-enabled styling tools and generative engine optimization (GEO) to enhance customer engagement, while cautiously considering the future role of AI agents shopping on behalf of consumers. [Extracted from the article]