AI for an industry
AI for retail shops and boutiques
Let a website chat give your posted return policy word for word, and let each vendor's invoice land in your inventory as a draft, checked against your order.
Updated October 16, 2026
In short
The questions a shop gets most often already have written answers: the return policy by the register, the size chart on the product page. A website chat can answer from those pages, and live stock counts can be added in the written plan where your point of sale allows it, at a price of their own. Reading vendor invoices into your inventory is a second job, priced apart.
Key facts
In its release of August 18, 2026, the Census Bureau estimated that e-commerce made up 17.1 percent of United States retail sales in the second quarter of 2026, seasonally adjusted.
Source: Census Bureau, Quarterly Retail E-Commerce Sales, 2nd Quarter 2026, checked October 15, 2026
California retailers that will not give a full refund, a credit or an equal exchange within seven days of purchase with a receipt must clearly display that policy.
Source: California Attorney General, Refund Policies, checked October 15, 2026
Retailers expected 19.3 percent of online sales to be returned in 2025, against 15.8 percent of all sales, the National Retail Federation and Happy Returns reported.
Source: National Retail Federation and Happy Returns, 2025 Retail Returns Landscape, checked October 15, 2026
The AI jobs that fit a retail shop
The jobs below are the ones we would suggest building first, in order, each priced in the written plan that follows a short call. A job with its own page links to it, with how it works and what moves its price.
- AI website chatQuotes your posted return policy and the size chart for a piece, and passes a stock question to your staff unless the plan adds your point of sale.A care plan, a monthly fee after launch.How it works
- AI paperwork and inboxEach vendor invoice becomes a draft in your inventory, line by line, with any quantity that differs from your purchase order marked for a person.Ops retainer, a monthly fee after launch.How it works
- Night shift and morning briefAfter closing, it sets the day's sales in the shop against your online store and lists each piece that sold out at the counter but still shows online.Ops retainer, a monthly fee after launch.How it works
- AI follow-up, text and emailConfirms a pickup time by text and email once your point of sale marks a hold or a special order ready.Ops retainer, a monthly fee after launch.How it works
Returns, from the policy you post
California asks a shop that will not give a refund, a credit or an exchange within seven days to post its policy where customers see it. The chat answers return questions from that same policy, word for word, so what a customer reads online matches the sign at the register.
Exceptions stay with your staff. The chat says what the policy says, and a request outside it, such as a return after the window, goes to a person.
Two stock counts, and which one is right
A shop that sells online keeps two counts, one in the point of sale and one in the online store, and they drift apart whenever a sale lands in one and not the other. The night shift reads both, where each maker allows outside programs in, and the written plan confirms that for each of them up front.
Invoices arrive in your inventory as drafts, and no count moves until someone at the shop accepts one.
A worked example (hypothetical)
Ten pairs of a sneaker that sells fast online were what a shoe shop in Larchmont ordered, but the invoice that arrives with the box on Tuesday bills for twelve.
The invoice goes through the paperwork job, set up for one kind of document, the vendor's invoice: it lands in the inventory as a draft with the two pairs billed beyond the order marked, so the owner counts the box and calls the vendor before paying. That night the night shift finds the last size nine, sold in the shop that afternoon, still listed online, and it heads the morning list. Invoices and the nightly count are two jobs, and the shop's written plan would price them one at a time.
The site and the software for a retail shop
A site that sells what the shop sells, with pickup in store and holds for your regulars.
Common questions
How does the chat know what is on the shelf?
Only through your point of sale, and only where the written plan adds that connection. Without it, the chat takes the customer's name and number, and someone checks the shelf.
Will it ring up a sale?
No. Customers buy on your online store or in the shop, and the chat never asks for card details.
Who decides about an invoice that differs from the order?
Someone at the shop. The invoice waits as a draft with the lines that differ from your order marked, and nothing is paid or counted until a person accepts it.
Will the chat know about a sale we are running?
Once the sale is on your site. It answers from your own pages, so it gives the dates and the terms you post there, and nothing you have not posted.
Start with a written plan
Tell us about the business and what you need. We reply with questions, then a written plan that lists the work and its price, and nothing starts until you have read it.