French startup Elyn wants customers to have more options and flexibility when shopping for goods online. In essence, the company is giving consumers the ability to try out a product before they buy it, according to TechCrunch.
Try Before You Buy: Shopping Without Commitment
Unlike the buy now, pay later (BNPL) option of spreading out a large payment over several installments, Elyn allows consumers to simply enter their card payment information and then get charged a few days later after they have received their items.
More specifically, consumers have five days to decide whether to keep the item, return it, or exchange it for another item. Elyn takes an undisclosed single-digit percentage of commission from the products that customers keep, per TechCrunch.
Elyn is also looking to solve a real pain point many consumers face during the e-commerce experience: an often tedious and inconvenient return policy that keeps many from making their purchases online to begin with. In fact, many consumers tend to scour a retailer’s return policy before deciding to make a purchase. And if they ultimately make it to their online cart and find steep shipping costs, most customers will simply abandon their cart.
If a customer wishes to return an item, Elyn will ask them a few questions to determine why the product needs to be returned. And similar to the returns process many retailers offer, consumers are presented with an option of how they’d like to receive their money back—original payment or gift card—as well as a way to exchange an item for a different size if that’s what they want.
E-commerce giant Amazon uses a similar program for its Prime Wardrobe program. Consumers can try out clothing, shoes, and accessories for seven days and be charged only for the items they keep.