How Thunai AI Scaled a Global Apparel and E-commerce Brand's Successful Holiday Season

Client Overview

Our client is a multinational apparel and lifestyle brand. It is a household name with operations spanning North America, Europe, and Asia.

They manage a complex portfolio of over 15,000+ SKUs. Their business has a large digital-first presence. For this client, the entire year is a build-up to the very important Q4 holiday rush. This six-week period accounts for over 40% of their annual revenue.

The Challenges: Handling the Black Friday Rush

For our client, an Apparel and e-commerce company, the holiday season was both an opportunity and a major operational problem. They faced a 400% surge in customer interactions. This surge was compressed into the period from Black Friday to New Year's.

Their existing systems and manual processes were struggling under the load.

• Inability to Grow Cost-Effectively: Hiring, training, and managing over 250 temporary seasonal agents used many resources. Training was often inconsistent. This led to incorrect answers on important issues like international shipping deadlines and complex return policies.
• High WISMO & Return Volume: Over 60% of their incoming queries were simple, repetitive (Where Is My Order?) or WISMO requests. This was followed by a large volume of returns in January. These low-value calls blocked their human agents. This delayed high-value sales and complex support queries.
• High-Impact Cart Abandonment: A large amount of revenue was being lost at the final checkout stage. Customers had last-minute questions about sizing, gift-wrapping, or delivery-by-Christmas guarantees. They would abandon their carts if they could not get an instant 24/7 answer.
• Lack of Real-Time Insight: Management lacked immediate information. They could not identify why customers were angry in real-time. This could be a failed promo code, a struggling shipping lane, or a website glitch. By the time they got the reports, the damage was done.

Thunai's Intelligent Solution: An AI-Based Holiday Peak

Thunai revolutionized the client's peak-season method by setting up its AI platform as the digital-first front line. It was designed to absorb volume, create sales, and supply essential insights.

The Thunai AI Voice and Chat agent was deployed 24/7. It connected directly with the client's Order Management System (OMS) and logistics APIs. This single connection allowed the AI to instantly and accurately resolve 65% of all incoming queries.

These were primarily WISMO and refund status checks, all without any human intervention. This deflected hundreds of thousands of calls. It saved the client over $127,000 in seasonal hiring costs. It also freed their main human agents to handle only the most complex escalations.

Most importantly, Thunai deployed its Proactive Checkout Agent to combat cart abandonment. The AI was trained to detect signals of checkout difficulty, such as hesitation on the payment page or failed promo code attempts. The AI would then proactively engage the customer in real-time. For example: Hi! I see that promo code isn't working. The correct code for 25% off is HOLIDAY25. Can I apply that for you? 

Beyond sales, Thunai's AI gave them unparalleled operational control:

• Automated Returns Management: To manage the January returns, Thunai's AI ran a Smart Returns Portal. The bot guided customers through an automated workflow. It captured precise return reasons (e.g., size medium, too small in arms) for analytics. It also presented instant store credit. This turned a costly process into a positive experience centered on retention.
  
• Real-Time Sentiment and Trend Dashboard: Thunai's 100% interaction analysis gave management a live view of the situation. They could see in real time that shipping partner X was the source of a surge in delivery complaints in the Midwest. This allowed them to reroute packages with a different carrier before the problem escalated.

Conclusion

Thunai's AI-based system changed the client's chaotic holiday rush. It became a controlled, profitable operation that could grow.

The platform automated 65% of repetitive queries and proactively saved sales at checkout. This not only saved the client $127,000 in operational costs. More importantly, it secured a highly successful Q4 by lowering cart abandonment by 17%. This solidified customer loyalty during the most important time of the year.