Ben Bridge Jeweler, one of Women in Retail Leadership Circle’s corporate partners, recently entered the metaverse by hosting a virtual store in Decentraland during Metaverse Fashion Week 2023 (MFW23), a global fashion industry event that took place March 28-31.

The event featured 60 participating brands — including DKNY, Tommy Hilfiger, Coach and adidas — that showcased their wearable collections, digital spaces and breakthrough activations in virtual storefronts or spaces. Approximately 26,000 active users attended MFW23, according to Decenrtraland.org, and just over half were new to the platform. Visitors returned an average of four times throughout the week.

Ben Bridge Jeweler’s experience at MFW23 was a huge success. In fact, Ben Bridge’s virtual store led the pack in terms of time spent in store. According to Vogue Business, “brands who led on total time spent in their Decentraland spaces included jeweler Ben Bridge Jeweler (47,695 minutes), as well as adidas (32,989 minutes), Tommy Hilfiger (37,852), DKNY (42,721) and Coach (31,194 ).” What’s more, the average Ben Bridge MFW23 visitor spent 14 minutes engaging with the company’s virtual store, according to GEEIQ — a near unheard-of statistic in the world of online advertising, where social media-originated brand impressions often clock in around three seconds.

How did Ben Bridge manage to keep consumers so engaged? The jeweler, unlike many other brands at MFW23, offered visitors the ability to participate in elaborate, gamified “quests” throughout a virtually reconstructed Ben Bridge store. Indeed, visitors to the Ben Bridge Jeweler store in the metaverse met characters — including the iconic Ben Bridge Heritage Clock and a personal jeweler designed to look like Lisa Bridge, president and CEO of Ben Bridge — who challenged them to find five watches and two diamond rings, as well as complete a quiz using information found in the experience. Winners were rewarded with 11 types of exclusive digital wearables inspired by Ben Bridge collections, such as a Toscano Gold Collection inspired black gold chained dress or a suit outfitted with responsibly sourced Ikuma Canadian diamonds.

Why did Ben Bridge decide to join an event in the metaverse? “Why wouldn’t we?” asked Regina Aiello, vice president of sales innovation and business partnerships at Ben Bridge Jeweler, who spearheaded the event. “Finding opportunities to connect with a new demographic is something we all look for. The metaverse is here to stay and those exploring it are becoming familiar with the brands that are there engaging with them, and thus becoming the brands they will then feel comfortable shopping with. If we truly look to grow our reach, we need to be with our customers when, and where they choose to be, so we must meet them in the metaverse.”