Kathleen S.C. Heberger, Responsible Research & Writing LLC, is a writer and researcher specializing in business technology and manufacturing trends. She covers fashion industry IT, advanced materials and supply chain issues.

February 16, 2023

Future Proofing Fashion Manufacturing

Future Proofing Fashion Manufacturing

Apparel manufacturers, brands and retailers square off daily with complex challenges. Brands must deliver high-quality goods in a sustainable way while meeting retail customer and consumer requirements for accurate information and on-time delivery. As a result, apparel manufacturers require fast, cost-effective, ESG-compliant production capabilities with excellent quality control.

It’s a tall order for everyone. But a journey of a thousand miles begins with taking step one.

As they walk their future-proofing paths, each business will have different crossroads to contemplate and choices to confront. However, there is common ground. Many want better supply chain visibility, flexibility, efficiency and proximity to market. That’s a big reason why companies such as Kimes Ranch have invested in end-to-end digital connectivity. A leading western wear brand founded in 2009, Kimes Ranch is implementing the CGS BlueCherry® Enterprise Suite to streamline processes, overcome operational complexity and improve strategic decision-making.

“As a brand, we have made it a top priority to identify the finest materials and the right teams to create products that are undeniably the best fit and highest quality,” said Matt Kimes, founder and president, Kimes Ranch, which makes its popular jeans brand in the USA. Technology to digitize operations will enable the family-run business to better manage operations and make products available to customers across many channels. The new supply chain solution will “ultimately provide the tools we need to continue to grow our business,” Kimes said.

Responsive, Responsible Apparel Manufacturing

Optimal Efficiency and Employee Productivity. A future-proof apparel factory is one with real-time visibility to products, orders, operators and overall plant performance. At the most competitive garment plants, executives, managers, supervisors, mechanics and operators all have access to relevant insights they need to perform their roles well. Production automation technology delivers actionable data direct to smart phones or tablets. This information highlights:

  • Order status
  • Machine downtime
  • Operator productivity toward goals
  • Quality control compliance
  • Potential bottlenecks

Nicaraguan apparel manufacturer Confexsa’s productivity has increased 10+ percent in the early stages of its CGS BlueCherry® Shop Floor Control (SFC) technology rollout. Its customers know the manufacturer is taking proactive measures to eliminate waste, inefficiencies and downtime in its processes, Confexsa president and owner Roberto Bequillard said in the white paper “How to Build Better Supplier Relationships While Boosting Efficiency.”

Likewise, Diltex Brands, a world-class lingerie manufacturer, is using BlueCherry SFC to modernize its operations, which span seven vertically integrated production facilities and one distribution center in Mexico. “Digital transformation and innovation have been constant since day one and have been a key driver in our success and leadership position in Latin America,” said David Romano, director, Diltex Brands. “From helping us deliver an outstanding shopping experience for customers to improving communications to increasing employee productivity, the right technology has been a true competitive advantage.”

Visibility: Improving Performance and ESG. Responsive apparel production close to consumer markets offers clearer visibility to orders, stronger quality control and greater transparency to ESG metrics. That’s been the case for KX Lab, an L.A.-based manufacturer of knit footwear uppers. KX Lab counts Southern California sneaker brand Clae as a customer. “Having a line of sight into factory operations — essentially, a backyard view from Clae’s own L.A. headquarters — has given the brand the ability to innovate, and iterate, on its creations quickly, while advancing its ESG goals,” KX Lab co-founder Joshua Katz told Sourcing Journal for the 2023 State of the Industry Report/Sourcing “Shifting Sands”

“KX’s highly automated production and proprietary assembly process, which leaves some of the more toxic or labor-intensive elements of shoemaking to robots, diminishes some of the common risks to worker health associated with footwear factories,” the report said.

Sourcing Journal and Alix Partners conducted research into apparel manufacturing, sourcing and sustainability trends for their 2022 Fashion in Focus Report, “New Norms and Paradigm Shifts.” They found that many apparel brands face challenges in gathering and tracking the most relevant apparel manufacturing data to improve both overall efficiency and ESG progress. The report emphasized the importance of supply chain digitalization to bridge these gaps.

“Digitalization is valuable in all areas of the business — from assortment planning and supplier collaboration through to final delivery — but companies still have room to grow in embracing technology,” the report said. “Technology can power better communications up and down the supply chain and smarter decision-making within it — whether it is choosing where to source, which production partners to work with, or how to fulfill an order. Companies are collecting data, but in many cases, these metrics are not being utilized, or they’re being stored in siloed spreadsheets rather than centralized, cloud-based platforms that would establish an accessible, single source of truth.”

Similar conclusions were presented in The State of Fashion 2023 report by The Business of Fashion (BoF) and McKinsey and Company. “Before brands can accurately talk about their [ESG] credentials, they should dig deep into their own operations and supply chains to gather data that they can benchmark effectively. For example, Swedish fashion brand Asket has invested in tracing its full supply chain and gathering data to communicate the origin, impact and cost of each garment to consumers,” the report said. “As regulators increase the requirements to back up any sustainability claims, investment in tools to gather and manage supply chain data is likely to become more widespread.”

Fast, Reliable Delivery: Proximity to Customers

Nearshoring Strategies. BoF’s and McKinsey’s research found that 65 percent of fashion executives are considering nearshoring as a means to avoid transport bottlenecks and political or social instability. They are creating new manufacturing hubs dedicated to serving U.S. and European demand. “Continued disruptions in supply chains are a catalyst for a reconfiguration of global production,” according to the “Futureproofing Manufacturing” section BoF/McKinsey’s annual report, which highlighted three executive priorities for fashion manufacturing:

  1. “Dial Up Speed and Flexibility: Strategies like vertical integration, nearshoring and small-batch production enable brands to better respond to shifting market and customer demands while reducing inventory costs.
  2. Invest in Digitization: Significant cost advantages can be gained across the production process by investing in tools such as automation and digital end-to-end integration of data.
  3. Collaborate Strategically: Brands and manufacturers should establish strategic partnerships to make investments required to future-proof their operations, achieving greater agility and visibility and reducing environmental impact.” (Source: BoF/McKinsey State of Fashion 2023 report.)

Newshoring. Evolution St. Louis has built a thriving on-demand knitwear business in St. Louis, MO, where it leverages 30 automated Stoll knitting machines, plus 3D printers, to make sweaters, socks, housewares and automotive parts. The company’s approach defies traditional apparel manufacturing and sourcing definitions. It’s an example of newshoring, a term coined by American Apparel & Footwear Association (AAFA) CEO Steve Lamar, Sourcing Journal recently reported.

“It’s amazing, the USA really starts to take on more resonance because there’s a desire for a lot of brands to maneuver around problems in the supply chains,” said John Erruchio, co-founder, Evolution St. Louis. “I think also a big driving factor is sustainability. To have true sustainability, you have to have a brand in the U.S.”

There is a lot of interest in newshoring, Lamar told Sourcing Journal. “We’re seeing people do new things with technology, with new production methods,” he said.

Americas Investment. In late January, the Biden Administration officially launched the Americas Partnership for Economic Prosperity (APEP), a trade and economic cooperation initiative within the Western Hemisphere. Participating nations include Barbados, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Mexico, Panama, Peru, the United States and Uruguay, with opportunity for others to join forces.

Another Biden Administration program, the Partnership for Central America (PCA), has supported nearshoring of more than $150 million in manufacturing supply chains to the Americas, according to Behind the Seams, the newsletter of the Sewn Product Equipment & Suppliers of the Americas (SPESA). Jonathan Fantini Porter, executive director and CEO, PCA, will present the keynote address at SPESA’s Executive Conference March 30-31 in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

Is your apparel production ready to face the future? Would you like to feel more confident in your supply chain’s ability to support your most important business goals?

To learn more about how CGS is partnering with customers to future proof apparel manufacturing, check out the news of Kimes Ranch’s end-to-end connectivity and Diltex Brands’ digitalization of shop floor operations.

Kathleen S.C. Heberger, Responsible Research & Writing LLC, is a writer and researcher specializing in business technology and manufacturing trends. She covers fashion industry IT, advanced materials and supply chain issues.

Shop Floor Control