Half-Baked Idea of the Week: Clothes With Friends

Welcome to the Half-Baked Idea of the Week. These are innovative ideas that may or may not already exist. Some ideas are more half-baked than others, and some are fully baked ideas. This week is my idea for an iPhone or Android app tentatively titled "Clothes With Friends".

Before I start this idea, I'm almost 99% sure that there is probably something that already exists like this. But I don't care. I got so excited when I thought of this that I'm just going to take credit for thinking of it regardless of if thousands of other people have already thought of it, too.

Warm up questions: What percent of the clothes that you own do you actually consistently wear? What percent of clothes have been folded in your closet for years? How many times have you seen a friend wearing an article of clothing that you want, whether it's a shirt, jeans, shorts or belt? What if there was a way to trade clothes with friends?

Well, guess what? Clothes With Friends would do that for you. The app would be a series of pictures of your clothes. So you have a separate tab for shirts, pants, jackets, etc. For instance, I have a ton of band t-shirts that I no longer wear, never have worn, or don't like the band anymore. I can take a picture of those shirts, put them up onto this app, and categorize it into my "t-shirt" section. It's the items in your closet that you think your friends would like. It's all the items in your closet you don't like. It's the items that you didn't know you still had. Okay, moving forward now.

Now, your friends are doing this too. It's not something like Craig's list where you can buy something from whoever. It's exclusive. You have to be Facebook friends with a person or something like that to view their closet. You can select a shirt and see either a) how much they are willing to sell it for or b) propose a trade. I'm really excited about the trade idea. So lets just say you want to trade for your friend's button down shirt. You can select the trade option, and propose a trade offering one or more of your items of clothing for the button down. The person receives a notification that says something close to "Will Harmon proposed a trade for your item 'Blue Button Down'!" Your friend reviews the trade, accepts, denies, or counter-proposes the trade. So not only are you getting rid of a shirt you don't like, but you can pick up a shirt that you have always wanted.

Maybe they have a little brother or sister that they could trade or purchase a shirt for. It doesn't necessarily have to be for that person with the app. You could trade shirts with the opposite gender, maybe for your sisters birthday or something like that. It's shopping for clothes that you like without having to go to the shopping mall and instead going to your friend's to pick up what you traded for or purchased. It's awkward to ask a friend if you can have a shirt of there's already, so if you see it on their closet part of the app, it's known that they are trying to get rid of it.

This app is without a doubt geared more towards the female species, and the success of the app will depend highly on if the girls like it or not. I think girls could be obsessed with it. It's essentially shopping for your friends clothes that they don't want anymore. If trades fail, there's always price tags. It would clear out your closet, it would provide for easy purchasing and renewing a wardrobe.

Honestly, I'd say I wear less than 30% of the clothes that I own. I would definitely try and put most of my clothes up on the closet. So not only would you dodge having to spend hundreds of dollars at the mall, you can just trade away your shirts that you don't want anymore. It's so simple, it would save a lot of money, it would clear out unwanted clothes. I just love this idea.

I'd say this is more of a 3/4 baked idea. Nearly fully baked. But obviously there are problems. Providing an accurate picture of what your shirt looks like would vary and it'd be hard to tell what your product is. Also, since I'm short, my shirt size or pant size would make it harder for me to trade with my friends that are bigger than me. Why would they want a shirt that's even too small for me? I am also not tech savvy whatsoever, so I would struggle setting this app up. But I think it has a lot of potential if the right people are behind it. And all it takes is for one girl to get the app, and ask her friend if she has "Clothes With Friends" to view her closet. Suddenly the amount of users takes off exponentially.

You can follow Will Harmon on Twitter at @willharmon8