By Jeffrey C. Gerrish
If you are not familiar, the metaverse is an alternate reality world created by Meta (f/k/a Facebook). According to Meta founder Mark Zuckerberg, the metaverse is the future of life as we know it, where all activities will happen in a virtual reality world. In the metaverse, individuals have unique avatars and the ability to move around the metaverse and interact with other avatars at various points of virtual reality. For example, one of the first metaverse events was a rave at a virtual nightclub.
To many community bankers, the idea of banking in the metaverse seems closer to laughable than it does to reality. However, we at Gerrish Smith Tuck, are not quite so certain that’s the case. If you’ve been paying attention, you will know that recently luxury brand Louis Vuitton bought “space” in the metaverse to establish a Louis Vuitton store.
The idea is apparently that the avatars will be able to enter Louis Vuitton’s physical space, which will essentially take them into a virtual reality store, and then buy Louis Vuitton’s products and services. What is yet to be seen is whether Louis Vuitton will ship physical products and services to these customers or whether they are simply buying virtual versions, such that an avatar might be able to have a Louis Vuitton purse or coat. We expect Louis Vuitton will probably do both.
Louis Vuitton’s recent move has us thinking about community banking. We have yet to see a community bank that has “purchase digital space in the metaverse for the establishment of a digital branch” as a strategic action item in their strategic action plan. While that may seem too “out there” today, we anticipate we are probably headed there at some point in the future. We do think it likely that in the not-too-distant future, financial services providers will look to establish digital branches within the metaverse, or other alternate reality worlds, and use those as an opportunity to try and further their customer interactions. While all this may seem heady, keep in mind that only 10 or so years ago the idea of pulling a phone out of your pocket and taking a picture of a check to deposit it seemed almost inconceivable.
Jeffrey C. Gerrish is chairman of the board of Gerrish Smith Tuck Consultants LLC and Gerrish Smith Tuck PC, Attorneys.
