In the past decade, storied brands like meal-replacement Huel and men's grooming company Harry's built multibillion-dollar retail businesses by using social media and digital-first advertising to sell directly to consumers online, without the need for middlemen. These brands were exemplars of a new form of retail, called direct-to-consumer (DTC). The global pandemic only accelerated this trend, with many high-street stores being forced to close and to keep driving sales by going direct to shoppers online. Some brands successfully navigated the transition, like outdoor pizza oven maker Ooni, whose sales exploded during lockdown, with annual revenue up from £13.7 million ($167 million) in 2019 to £52.7 million in 2020. Shoppers also adapted--around 60 percent purchased from a direct-to-consumer brand at least once in 2021.

These solutions are especially popular with digitally native brands, which rely on more personalized customer interactions, figuring out a seamless way to handle customer service inquiries at scale, instant message technology that's complemented with some AI bot functionality has become a more popular choice. These companies receive a bunch of inbound website traffic because of the very nature of the direct-to-consumer business, and have found the increasing need to have a chat interface to answer customer questions. But instead of relying on the old AI-only models, they are using a variety of technology to better and more personally answer inquiries and lead clients on their purchase journey. For a DTC brand like Brooklinen, seamless customer service interactions are of the utmost importance. According to Jack Lorentzen, a customer experience manager for the bedding brand, the most important aspect of live chat is that customers are never talking to voiceless machines.