GM. This is Needs to Exist (aka NTE), delivering you a startup idea that’ll finally fix online shopping by making sizing accurate forever.

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NTE Zero to One: turn a single idea into something the world can’t ignore.

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Here’s what we’ve got for you today.

• Daily Idea - Size Passport Activated

• Fashion Time Travelers’ Council

The Last Size Scan Ever

The One Liner

Perfect-fit fashion from one five-second body scan.

The 140 character tweet (or X) version

Scan your body once in a pop-up showroom, get a lifelong digital sizing profile that makes every online order fit perfectly with zero returns.

The Longer Story Version

The Problem

Online clothing returns are a $100B sinkhole because the sizing system is basically astrology.
Brands pretend they “standardize.” Shoppers pretend they know their size. Then reality hits:

A medium fits like a large.
A large fits like a toddler shirt.
You return it, they burn margin, the planet eats another polyester sadness-pile.

Everyone loses.

The real issue: there’s no universal, trusted, accurate “digital body identity.”
Every time you buy clothes online, you’re guessing.
Every time brands ship, they're gambling.
Multiply that by millions of customers and you get the mess we’re in.

The Solution

Imagine walking into a pop-up in NYC, LA, Austin, Miami and you step into a sleek pod, and in five seconds, your body gets captured by a high-precision 3D scan.

The system builds a private digital profile of your exact measurements.
Not “medium-ish.” Not “athletic fit.”
Your literal geometry.

This profile becomes your Fit Passport, a universal sizing identity you carry everywhere online.

Buy from any retailer → your passport picks the right size for that brand.
Try a new label → it already knows how their cuts fit your body.
Order jeans → no more denim roulette.

One scan → lifelong sizing accuracy.

How We’d Build It

Stage 1: Prove It (MVP that actually works)
• Use existing hardware: iPhone Pro lidar + Polycam Pro + a calibrated booth setup.
• Build a simple scanning pop-up in one boutique using Vibe Coding tools for fast prototypes (Lovable, Replit Ghostwriter, or Cursor).
• Store measurements as a “Fit Passport” in a secure Supabase instance.
• Hard-code the first brand integrations manually (literally map sizes to measurements).

Goal: prove people will show up for the scan and actually use the sizing passport for one or two retail partners.

Stage 2: Make It Real (early traction, still scrappy)
• Swap lidar for Orbbec or Revopoint 3D scanners (cheap, accurate, portable).
• Automate measurement extraction using a fine-tuned size-mapping model (Modal + OpenAI Vision).
• Build partnership tools: a tiny “Fit API” retailers can plug into with 3 endpoints.
• Add a consumer dashboard so people can tweak preferences (looser, tighter, athletic, relaxed).

Goal: show this reduces returns and increases conversion for 5–10 pilot brands.

Stage 3: Scale (the “this could be huge” phase)
• Expand pop-ups using turnkey retail partners like Leap or Brookfield’s retail-as-a-service spaces.
• Offer retailers a “Return Reduction Guarantee” to onboard them faster.
• Launch a drop-in plugin for Shopify Plus, BigCommerce, and Fabric.
• Let users share a secure passkey so they never re-enter size info again.

Goal: become the TSA PreCheck of clothing sizes - one scan everywhere.

Why It Needs to Exist
Because online shopping is the future, but online sizing is stuck in the past.
Because shoppers hate guessing.
Because brands are drowning in return costs.
Because the tech finally exists to make this real - cheap scanners, accurate AI measurement tools, exploding pop-up retail, and consumers who are already comfortable with biometric profiles.

This is the bridge the fashion industry has been pretending it doesn’t need.
But once someone builds it, everyone else will rush to catch up.

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The Fashion Time Travelers’ Council

A Debate on Whether Humanity Is Finally Ready for Accurate Clothing Sizes
(Yes, this actually gets weird.)

The doors swing open and four figures step into a circular room lit by a single spotlight.
Every century gets one representative. They’ve been summoned to judge a new invention: a five-second body-scan pop-up that creates a lifelong Fit Passport so you never guess a clothing size again.

The council begins.

First up: The 1800s Tailor.
He walks in with a tape measure around his neck like a stethoscope.
“For centuries,” he says, “I have been the human API for measurements. Shoulders, inseams, waistlines… I’ve wrapped this tape around more strangers than a Victorian doctor.”
He squints at the proposal.
“A machine that measures perfectly? No lying? No guessing? Finally, the end of the ‘Why does this medium feel like a corset?’ era.”

He sits. He’s clearly all in.

Next: The 1970s Designer.
He glides in wearing sunglasses indoors, obviously.
“Love the vision,” he says. “But can it handle bell-bottom variance? Flare radius? Psychedelic drape? We engineered chaos on purpose. It was part of the vibe.”
He leans back.
“Still… people looked incredible. Maybe perfect sizing could’ve saved us from some questionable silhouettes.”

He’s a soft yes.

Then: The 1990s Mall Brand Rep.
She storms in holding a stack of polos, each labeled “Medium” but clearly different sizes.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa. This idea threatens the entire business model,” she says.
“You think size charts are supposed to make sense? Honey… they’re marketing weapons. Every brand tweaks sizes so customers feel skinnier. If we standardize things, we lose our biggest revenue engine: emotional manipulation.”

She crosses her arms. She is a hard no. (Also: she is exactly why this idea needs to exist.)

Finally: The 2050 AI Stylist.
It floats in. No feet. Just vibes.
“We’ve been waiting for this layer,” it says in a flat, soothing voice.
“Once everyone has a Fit Passport, clothing becomes fully autonomous. Your future wardrobe won’t ask your size, it will know. You’ll subscribe to clothes the way you subscribe to Spotify. Everything will arrive pre-tailored. Zero returns.”
It pauses.
“This is the missing data layer between fabric and identity.”

It’s a yes. A futuristic, inevitable yes.

And then the council starts arguing.

The 1800s Tailor accuses the Mall Rep of “committing crimes against waistlines.”
The Mall Rep fires back: “People LIKE the lies! It’s emotional support sizing!”
The 1970s Designer chimes in: “We dressed people like disco peacocks. Maybe they deserved better data.”
And the AI Stylist just hovers, whispering: “Human inconsistency must be sanded down with math.”

At some point, it becomes clear: sizing chaos wasn’t an accident. It was a mirror.
Every century added its own flavor of insecurity.
Corsets. Shoulder pads. Low-rise jeans. “One-size-fits-none.”
The problem wasn’t fashion, it was humanity’s psychological instability.

Which weirdly makes the Fit Passport idea feel unstoppable.

Because once everyone agrees that the chaos is dumb - shoppers, brands, tailors, even future AIs, the only thing left is the solution that fixes it in one scan.

The council votes.

Three yes. One no (and she’s the reason the idea will print money).

Motion passes.

Humanity is finally ready for clothes that fit.

Confessions From the “Oops, I Accidentally Built a Startup” Hotline

You’ve reached the Accidental Founder Hotline.
Please listen to our newest voicemails:

“Uh… hey… I automated my cat’s feeding schedule and somehow ended up with a recurring-revenue pet-tech SaaS? People keep asking for API access. I don’t know what’s happening.”

“So I made a workout timer for myself… and now 200 churches use it to time their sermons? They’re asking for enterprise pricing. Please advise.”

“I built a tool to flirt better in DMs, but my boss saw it and turned it into our company’s B2B sales engine. Now I’m leading ‘growth.’ I wanted a date, not a promotion.”

All of these came from ideas that didn’t even sound like ideas…
until they were.

That’s the whole energy inside NTE Pro.
Nearly 6,000 startup sparks that start as jokes, hacks, accidents and then blow up in ways you can’t predict but definitely can ride.

It’s $99/year.
Cheaper than one bad impulse purchase, but way more likely to turn into something people ask you about at parties.

Warning:
Side effects may include unintentionally launching a business, surprisingly large Stripe payouts, and friends asking, “Wait… how did this become a thing?”

If you’re still curious, you know where to click.

Sign Up For NTE Pro Today

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