"Luxury equaled to quality for many and for many others, fashion labels also equated to safety. They felt safe in buying certain brands like Volvo and Rolex as they ensured quality and a complete value for money to their consumers. However, over decades many luxury brands exploited this sentiment to unreasonably increase the price of their products. For instance, the Saint Laurent leather jacket, which consumers believe to be made from the best materials, plays on their psyche of having invested in a high work of art."

Luxury equaled to quality for many and for many others, fashion labels also equated to safety. They felt safe in buying certain brands like Volvo and Rolex as they ensured quality and a complete value for money to their consumers. However, over decades many luxury brands exploited this sentiment to unreasonably increase the price of their products. For instance, the Saint Laurent leather jacket, which consumers believe to be made from the best materials, plays on their psyche of having invested in a high work of art.

Fashion brands choose profit over quality

Today, the 20 biggest fashion companies of the world gobble up 97 per cent profit share. To achieve their set targets, these companies either slash the quality of their garments or increase prices. In fact, to sell their low quality clothes at higher prices, they double down on their runway shows, ad campaigns and influencer relationships, which ups the visibility – and lustability – of what they make, rather than the quality.

The result: clothes have become status symbol. Gucci, a brand which originally made goods from high-end leather goods, now makes clothes for the millennials that includes T-shirts, sweats, trainers and phone cases in coffer-swelling numbers. Like brand tees, they’re a way rep your love of the brand in a (comparatively) accessible way. But all this is quite different from what ‘luxury’ originally denoted.

Creating a hype to increase sales

Experts point out if something’s hyped, it doesn’t matter what material it’s made out of, if you want it. For example, Supreme’s box logo tees, which despite retailing for less insane prices, resell for up to £500. To create this hype, brands limit their accessibility. Supreme does it by creating lesser products. Others do it with price: Enfants Riches Déprimes, sells £1,400 hoodies, specifically to lock out a mass consumer. For Vetement, it’s about irony. Its DHL T-shirt appeals to only handful of fashion insiders.

Luxury brands would rather make a loss on their product than have their exclusivity diluted by selling it at markdown. These days consumers can buy mid-to-accessible luxury goods from smaller upstart brands, or even the high street, that are as good as or better than the pieces you would get from LVMH. The price reflects the prestige and branding of the product, so you get a £700 branded sweatshirt that was manufactured for less than £50.

Environmental consequences

The big loser is the planet which has to bear the environmental catastrophes caused by clothing industry. As per Fashion Transparency Index, which ranks brands according to how opaque their supply chains are, no luxury label appears in the top half. Though some have started revealing how their clothes are made, the prevailing trend is that the more expensive the clothes, the less clarity they offer about how they’re made. This is the opposite of how the luxury industry’s long positioned itself, as the home of craft and quality. A huge proportion of couture pieces today are sold at a loss to bestow an aura of quality on goods that are made cheaply but sold at massive markup.

The accelerated fashion cycle, where trends disappear in a matter of months, does not encourage craftsmanship. Instead, consumers prefer to buy clothes with a shelf life, both in terms of how they look and how they’re made. Instead of buying from established designers, they prefer products of the same quality from an upcoming independent designer.

The Environmental Audit Committee (EAC) published its report on the fashion industry and the waste that it creates. The report outlines how British people buy more clothes per person than any other country in Europe. What’s more, this amounts to more than 300,000 tonne of textile waste flooding landfills or being incinerated. The report makes a number of recommendations, including creating mandatory targets on sustainability for all fashion retailers that have an annual turnover of £36 million (approximately $47 million) or more.

It also advances a scheme called Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) scheme. EPR would allow for monitoring compliance with sustainability criteria—for example identifying water usage and how to reduce it—and give benefits to companies who lower their environmental impacts. In practice this might mean a one-penny-per-garment charge which could be waived when retailers demonstrate they have attempted to reduce their impact in meaningful ways.

The report urges the government to support these efforts by shifting taxation systems to more directly encourage reuse, repair and recycling. It also advocates using models like those in Sweden that reduce VAT on clothing repair. This report offers a refreshing insight into an industry that has cultivated rock-bottom prices at a high, hidden cost. It highlights the people caught in its exploitative manufacturing chains and the wider public, who are getting poor-quality merchandise that is harming the environment. The report zeroes in on how fast fashion has failed and how a return to a culture of paying more for quality that will last is one of the key answers.

In 2018, Turkey’s textile exports increased seven per cent compared to the previous year. There are approximately one million people employed in the country’s textile and readymade clothing sectors. This number reaches two million if sectors such as retail and merchandising are included.

The Turkish textile sector has a strong image in the global market. The sector stands out with its state-of-the-art technology, flexible production ability, capability of producing special products and high-quality workforce. It is the biggest textile manufacturer in Europe. It continues to make significant breakthroughs not only in design and fashion but also in technical textiles.

Turkey is the seventh biggest cotton producer in the world. It has the biggest machinery park in the world. The biggest factory manufacturing quilt covers is in Turkey. The country is one of the top three towel suppliers in the world. The share of Turkey in global textile exports stands at three per cent, at 4.5 per cent in home and interior textiles and 1.5 per cent in technical textiles.

The Turkish textile sector has a very high potential especially in terms of value added production. The Turkish textile and readymade clothing sector as a whole has the highest foreign trade surplus. The sector ranks first in the country in terms of share in the gross domestic product and in terms of parameters such as domestic input use.

A new program launched in the UK aims at improving speed, productivity and sustainability in the clothing supply chain. The program, called Future Fashion Factory, is exploring ways to introduce new technology into the design process, shorten lead times and reduce waste. It has been set up to drive the UK’s economic growth by developing new products and services, creating new jobs and developing skills.

Future Fashion Factory is set to run until 2023 and has industry-wide backing, from companies making British yarns and fabrics – such as cashmere manufacturer Joshua Ellis and woolen mill AW Hainsworth – to some big retailers and brands, including Burberry.

Future Fashion Factory is expected to transform the UK industry’s capacity for new product innovation and create circular fashion technologies that reduce lead times and waste within the design process. The aim is to create a platform through which new technologies and processes can be developed and implemented.

The program’s focus includes developing data analytics and AI tools, and to help designers with decision making. It will also look at where waste is created in the production cycle, and examine ways to close the loop, developing new product designs that minimise waste at the end of product life, and making recycling easier and more effective.

Garment manufacturers in the Philippines want more tax incentives and subsidies. They feel subsidies, particularly for labor and power expenses, will bring down the cost of doing business in the country. In the meantime corporate income tax is being lowered and the tax incentive system is being revamped.

The textile and garment industry used to be competitive globally and was considered a sunrise industry in the 1990s. Export performance, however, dropped since the abolition of textile quotas by the World Trade Organization in 2005. As a result, garment and textile enterprises in the Philippines that relied on quotas underwent difficulties, leading to the closure of factories and downsizing.

Garment manufacturers say once the sector is revived, the Philippines can penetrate more markets, especially Southeast Asia, aside from the United States. One opportunity they see is that neighboring countries such as Bangladesh, Vietnam, Sri Lanka and Myanmar are bursting with orders, have no more space for fresh new production and that this is the time for the Philippines to step in and take the opportunity. The US accounts for 60 per cent of Philippines’ garment exports. The rest are sold to the EU and Asian countries.

During the first nine months of the current financial year, KPR’s revenues increased by eleven per cent. Out of its total revenue, domestic sales contribute 59 per cent and exports 41 per cent. Total production increased by 15.84 per cent.

KPR Mills, based in Coimbatore, has increased its capacity to 115 million garments a year. It has emerged as one of the largest vertically integrated textile players with a presence across the entire value chain, from fiber to fashion. It is one of the largest knitted garment manufacturers in the country.

Its entire yarn capacity has been upgraded to value-added yarn (compact, melange, color melange, PC, slub and grindle yarn). Currently 19 per cent of the yarn produced is consumed captively to manufacture value-added products. Yarn sales contribute around 45 per cent to total revenue.

In fabric production, currently 60 per cent of the production is used for captive consumption to manufacture value-added products. The rest is sold to knitted apparel export manufacturers. Currently fabric sales contribute to five per cent of total revenues.

Key export markets of the company include Europe, Australia and the US. The company has set up a facility in Ethiopia with an annual capacity of ten million garments.

Indorama Ventures (IVL) has completed acquisition of M&G Fibras Brasil, in Cabo de Santo Agostinho, Brazil. The Cabo plant manufactures and supplies polyester staple fibre, with total polymerisation capacity of 75,000 ton per annum. This acquisition is the company’s debut into the fibre business in Brazil and is a strategic step forward. It provides IVL a unique opportunity to add capacity in fibres and establish its presence in South America’s largest economy, Brazil.

The acquisition will significantly boost IVL’s presence in the fast-growing market in Brazil, where the domestic demand is expected to grow in response to a recent recovery in consumption. In addition, IVL is well-positioned to expand more into nonwoven applications which are growing strongly in Brazil, supported by the presence of global brands.

IVL has a good track record of successfully integrating acquired business into its operations. IVL anticipates lowering its fixed costs by creating synergies and operating efficiencies, driven by supply chain optimization with the delivery of PTA from a nearby location, and consolidation of its commercial offices by joining with IVL’s PET site.

Kitex has plans for expansion and diversification. As a first step, the company is planning to add production capacity across the value chain, which includes expansion of the knitting capacity and the processing capacity to 80 tons each.

As for diversification, the company is planning to venture into manufacturing and sale of new products for the infant category, which includes products like socks for children, baby diapers and baby wet wipes. Kitex is also seriously considering vertical integration of its manufacturing value chain with the setting up of a cotton spinning mill for yarn production with a capacity of 80 tons a day. It is also setting up manufacturing facilities for ancillary materials such as cartons, tapes and paper tags.

Kitex, incorporated in 1992, manufactures and exports infant wear to apparel retailers based out of the US and other developed markets. The company has a fully integrated manufacturing facility in Kerala with a facility to manufacture 2.7 lakh pieces a day. The company has established relationships with leading international brands.

As part of the strategic future growth initiative, Kitex is planning to increase revenues by promotion of its own brand, Little Star, and a licensed brand Lamaze. It is also aiming at growth in the private label business with existing clients.

Exporters’ body FIEO says more products like jewellery and auto-components should be included the list of items that enjoy export incentives through e-commerce. Currently only items such as handicraft, handloom, books, leather footwear, and toys get exports incentives under Merchandise Exports from India Scheme (MEIS). Under MEIS, the government provides duty benefits depending on product and country. The proposed policy should bring uniform definition of e-commerce as various acts and policies define the world differently.

The limitation of Rs 25,000 for e-commerce exports or imports through courier, should be either removed or enhanced to Rs 5 lakh so that high value shipments can be exported through courier mode availing fast track facility. On February 23, the commerce and ministry released a draft proposal for setting up a legal and technological framework for restrictions on cross-border data flow and, also laid out conditions for businesses regarding collection or processing of sensitive data locally and storing it abroad.

Indra Nooyi has joined Amazon as director. She has been granted 549 shares of common stock, which will vest in three equal annual installments beginning on May 15, 2020. She is the second woman to be named to the e-commerce giant’s board this month. Earlier this month, the company named Starbucks’ chief operating officer Rosalind Brewer as director, the second black woman to serve on its board.

Indra Nooyi comes to Amazon from Pepsi. Nooyi, who will be part of the audit committee of Amazon's board, stepped down as the CEO of Pepsi in October 2018 and as the chairman of the beverage-and-snack maker earlier this year. Amazon’s 11-member board now has five women including Nooyi, Brewer, Jamie Gorelick, Judith McGrath and Patricia Stonesifer.

Amazon has a new policy of increasing diversity on its board. Last year, facing an employee backlash and public criticism from black and Hispanic members of Congress, Amazon adopted a new policy to consider a slate of diverse candidates, including women and minorities, for future openings on its board. The company said at the time that it was merely formalizing its existing practice.

Corporations are increasingly being called upon to increase board diversity.