FW
"Gone are the days when fast fashion brands could lure customers to the store to possess the most inspirational label. Even a decade back every teenager’s dream was own a Calvin Klein, a Ralph Lauren or a Tommy Hilfiger. Each has a distinctive style well portrayed in glossy advertisements to create the aspiration in the consumer psyche."
Gone are the days when fast fashion brands could lure customers to the store to possess the most inspirational label. Even a decade back every teenager’s dream was own a Calvin Klein, a Ralph Lauren or a Tommy Hilfiger. Each has a distinctive style well portrayed in glossy advertisements to create the aspiration in the consumer psyche. Today the scenario has changed. Interestingly these attractive, million dollar ads somehow fail to create similar excitement which has resulted in plunging sales. In fact, a few legendary American brands which pioneered ‘fast fashion’ and ‘aspirational brand’ are now facing a downward spiral in sales, giving a clear indication towards shifting consumer psyche. Brands like Calvin Klein, Michael Kors, Tommy Hilfiger and Ralph Lauren are coping with slow sales and shutting down stores.
Biggies suffered from being class to mass
Analysing the changed market behavior, Charles Lawry, a professor at Pace University's business school specializing in studying luxury market says “high-end American brands have been creating cheaper products for decades now. Ralph Lauren was one of the first American luxury brands to reach across many different categories, and that is really what made it successful. For a time, this strategy was extremely lucrative; soon, other brands followed suit, including MK by Michael Kors and Donna Karan's DKNY”. During early 2000s, fashion brands like Donna Karan, Ralph Lauren, and Coach became public company while by 2010, Phillips Van Heusen Corp owned both Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger. With new set of investors coming on board, almost all companies were forced to explore the bigger market instead of the niche luxury segment. To sustain the growth brands lowered the cost of manufacturing to making the brand accessible to new a wider spectrum of consumers. “There was an over-expansion and distribution into places like factory stores, which presented a tremendous economic opportunity. But it came at the expense of the brand. If you start training the consumer to believe that the brand is widely distributed in factory outlets, people who were once your core customer will start doing that, or lose interest in the brand altogether” says Eric Korman, Ralph Lauren's president of digital and e-commerce between 2010-2014.
Dip in sales was also a result of low skilled manpower engage in manufacturing set up in countries like Vietnam and China. With globalization and an effort to cut cost by going overseas, these megabrands that were once known for high quality started to see their quality deplete and decay. Moreover, in 2008, the US economy hit new lows due to recession. During the recession and post-recession, these brands went further by having a lot of these products trickle down to discount retailers. Now there's nothing remotely glamorous about picking up that same Coach bag in a messy, overcrowded department store with harsh lighting and thousands upon thousands of mass-produced articles.
New Age brands take on the giants
Over the last few years, the market dynamics has changed with a new generation of high quality, reasonably priced and direct to consumer brand coming up. Big brands were focused to tap wider customers and in the process lose their uniqueness. Startup companies too saw this opportunity to redefine premium fashion and educate customers about how high-end goods are made. The internet did not made it easier to buy products online. Another important distinction between these fashion startups and older apparel companies is that they are much less flashy. The internet has democratized brands. People are willing to pay for something special and they want to know how their products are made and, these days, it is possible to find exactly what they are looking for online. Now, the big question is whether the once great American brands can right their ships and regain consumer trust by improving quality, cutting back distribution channels, and speaking to the world in a more relatable voice.
Under Armour, the US-based performance brand has chosen Lectra as an official partner for its manufacturing and design centre, the Lighthouse, which opened in Baltimore, Maryland. Under Armour is a leader in performance footwear, apparel and equipment which sells its apparel and footwear products worldwide to athletes at all levels. Lectra is a leader in integrated technology solutions dedicated to industries using fabrics, leather, technical textiles and composite materials.
The new facility will showcase the latest technology and serve as an incubator for creating state-of-the-art product with efficient manufacturing methods. Lectra shares Under Armour's commitment to helping manufacturers and brands attain operational excellence and deliver better products to market faster.
The Lighthouse will employ Lectra's advanced cutting-room solutions, in particular, the Brio fabric spreader and the Vector fabric-cutting machine. It will provide a collaborative space for designers and manufacturers to learn and develop new and innovative methods for making and delivering product, which can then be shared with global teammates and partner factories.
Lectra’s innovative Smart Services provides enhanced visibility to the production processes through remote monitoring. This predictive technology is designed to optimize machine up-time and production.
A new type of fabric could change the way smart clothing is made. The space cloth is the first non-woven material made from yarn with strong potential for use as a smart textile due to its unique structure, with space to encase copper wiring, LEDs and more. Because of the material’s linear channels of yarn, it has great potential to be used as a smart textile. In particular, it lends itself well to being embedded with microcapsules containing medication or scent, to either help deliver drugs to specific parts of the body or to create antibacterial and aromatic clothing.
The material has potential in other applications as well, such as wall coverings, in addition to clothing. It is also not quite as challenging to make as other knit or weave fabrics, which makes its production easier on the environment.
The space cloth is called Zephlinear, comes from the merger of two words, zephyr and linear. It was given the nickname space cloth due to its appearance and its e-textile capabilities. The material is strongest and most efficient when created from natural yarns, such as 100 per cent wool, hair or wool and silk mixtures, but it can also be made from synthetic yarns.
Senthil Kumar has been re-elected chairman of the Southern India Mills' Association (SIMA) the apex body of textile mills. Kumar has over 40 years of experience in the textile field. He has been actively serving the industry with his participation in various national and state level textile forums. He was the chairman of the Powerloom Development and Export Promotion Council from December 2002 to January 2005. He is the promoter, chairman and managing director of Palladam Hi-tech Weaving Park.
Kumar is also the director, Confederation of Indian Textile Industry, New Delhi, director, Apparel, Made Ups and Home Furnishing Sector Skill Council, Haryana, director, Textiles Sector Skill Council, New Delhi, and managing director, BKS Textiles.
SIMA was set up in 1933. SIMA is the single largest employers’ organisation representing the organised textile industry in the world and the only employers’ organisation of the textile industry having in-house expertise to advise right from designing the textile project to marketing. Equipped with a strong data base, it advises members on all functional areas of the textile industry. SIMA has made unique contributions in the areas of industrial relations, human resource development, industrial engineering etc. It plays a lead role in all textile policy making bodies in South India including Planning Commission work group relating to textiles.
The Society of Dyers and Colourists Education Charity, India (SDC EC) successfully organised its Colour Event 10/ 2016 on September 2 at Rachana Sansad, Prabhadevi. The event included three technical lectures and an award ceremony. The technical lectures were followed by presentations by top nine entries for the International Design Competition 2016. Soon after, the process of felicitation of the winners of the competition was done.
The Technical session started with Rachana Singh’s presentation on ‘entrepruneship’. She shared her experiences on the various stages of starting an entreprunal company. The sharing was inspirational for the students to understand as to what should be their focus and what efforts they need to put in if they want to achieve their aspirational goals.
The second lecture was on ‘How did I get here’ by Aniket Satam. He communicated very well with the students about his experiences and success story of being in the fashion industry. He shared various instances of successes and failures in his career. His talk motivated the students to think out of the box & not let failures bring them down.
Lipika Nair spoke about Digital Printing and shared technical aspects of digital designing and its reproduction on fabrics. The do’s and don’ts of design and expectations from a designer’s perspective was shared with the audience.
After the technical session, all top 9 entries were invited on the stage to talk on their boards and the thought behind it. The theme for this year’s design competition was ‘Make it personal’. All top nine entries were unique with different products and usages. The event was attended by more than 120 students, faculties, heads of the department and principals of various institutes and industry professionals.
The global spandex market is estimated to grow at a CAGR of more than eight per cent from 2016 to 2023. It is also commonly known as elastane. A growing application scope in the apparel and textile industry is likely to drive the spandex market over the forecast period.
Dry spinning technology has been majorly preferred by manufacturers over the past few years. Other processes include wet spinning, melt extrusion and reaction spinning. Asia Pacific accounted for more than 60 per cent of the total volume in 2015. China accounted for a major chunk of the market in the Asia Pacific region in 2015. The market is expected to grow with the recovery in the US economy.
Increase in automobile production, particularly in the Asia Pacific, is likely to drive growth. Major automobile manufacturers are shifting bases to countries such as Indonesia, Thailand, India and China owing to cheap labor wages and favorable incentive schemes. China accounted for more than 50 per cent of the global share in 2014 and is the major manufacturer for this market. In 2012, China had around 30 manufacturing units with a total capacity of 520 kilo tons and domestic production exceeding 320 kilo tons.
More than 250 businesses, both domestic and international will take part in the 16th Vietnam International Textile and Garment Industry Exhibition (VTG 2016) at the Saigon Exhibition and Convention Center from November 23 to 26. VTG 2016 is considered to be a good opportunity for suppliers and manufacturers in the sector to meet others in the field.
Besides domestic firms, exhibitors from Thailand, Singapore, Japan, Hong Kong, Germany, Italy, South Korea, India, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Taiwan and China are expected to showcase their machinery, equipment and materials for the textile and garment sector in nearly 500 stalls in the exhibition. Compared to last year, the stall area of VTG 2016 will be 80 per cent bigger as there will be more exhibitors including machines and equipment manufacturers for weaving, automated fabric cutting, yarn spinning, dyeing, embroidery and knitting, chemicals, machinery for printing patterns on fabric and garment accessories.
Pham Xuan Hong, chairman of the HCMC Association of Garment- Textile-Embroidery-Knitting (AGTEK), said that companies in the sector have high demand for advanced technologies to raise their output to compete with imported products. Hence, the exhibition will be an opportunity for them to find what they want. VTG 2016 is organized by Vietnam National Trade Fair and Advertising Company (Vinexad), Taiwan’s ChanChao International Co Ltd, Hong Kong’s Yorkers Trade & Marketing Service Co Ltd and Paper Communication Exhibition Services, AGTEK and the Vietnam Cotton & Spinning Association (VCOSA). Last year’s exhibition attracted around 12,000 visitors and saw many contracts signed.
Cinte Techtextil will be held in China, October 12 to 14, 2016. With around 450 exhibitors from 26 countries, buyers will be presented with a wide range of sourcing options. This is a technical textile and nonwoven fair. Product groups include technology and machinery, woven and knitted fabrics, nonwovens, coated textiles, composites, surface and bonding techniques, fibers and yarns, and more.
There will be pavilions from Korea, Taiwan, Belgium, Germany and Italy as well as an European Zone and Chinese regional pavilions. Notable exhibitors from Taiwan include Mytrex, which will showcase melt-blown nonwoven fabrics with sound absorption features for automobile interiors, a product that was previously used in the filter sector. FTC is bringing its blended flame-retardant fabrics to the fair with bacterial resistance, deodorisation, anti-static and wear-proof features. Healthy Machinery has a range of machines for producing medical textiles.
Two of the big names from Korea are Sam Hwa Machinery and Daejung. Sam Hwa makes needle punching machines as well as nonwoven production lines for geo textiles, automotive interiors, artificial leather and more. Daejung produces high tenacity polyester woven geo textiles, bi-axial and uni-axial woven geo textiles made of polyester multifilament yarn and bi-axial woven geo textiles made of polypropylene multifilament yarn.
Mali, Africa’s second biggest cotton producer is set to harvest a record crop because of good rainfall. Favorable weather, subsidies for fertilizers have also helped boost the harvest due to end in March. The goal is to reach 8, 00,000 tons in 2018.
Mali’s cotton and gold account for about 80 per cent of the nation’s export earnings. The cotton industry provides income to four million people, out of a total population of 15 million. Economic growth is expected to decelerate to 5.3 per cent this year from six per cent in 2015, driven by slower expansion in agricultural output. This would still be above the historical average of about 4.5 per cent.
Neighboring Burkina Faso is Africa’s largest producer of cotton. Mali wants to step up local processing of cotton seed, which is currently at about two per cent. There are 17 deseeding factories and plans are to increase this to 22. The plan is also to increase sales of cotton fiber at the international level, mainly to China and north Africa. Europe’s large clothing retailers source from factories in Ethiopia, and Mali wants to attract similar brands. One lakh hectares planted with cotton will be watered within three years.
Intex South Asia 2016, the region's premier sourcing fair will be held at the Sri Lanka Exhibition and Convention Centre (SLECC), Colombo from November 16 to 18. It would connect the country’s apparel and textile world to South Asia. Intex South Asia focuses on the South Asian region because it is the second largest hub for textile and apparel manufacturing in the world, second only to China. Given its strategic location, logistical connectivity and neutrality, Sri Lanka is the ideal location for a pan-regional show.
The Fair has the distinction of being the only international sourcing show in South Asia that brings together over 150 global suppliers of yarns, apparel fabrics, denims and clothing accessories from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, China, Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Indonesia among many others.
This year there has been an increase of 41 per cent from last year's show. This year too, the Fair has been endorsed by the High Commission of India, Colombo; the Export Development Board of Sri Lanka (EDB); Joint Apparel Association Forum (JAAF) and other trade bodies in Sri Lanka, South Asia and other regions.
Intex South Asia, with its theme ‘One Show - One Platform - One World’ would attract garment exporters and manufacturers, buying houses and agents, importers, distributors and traders, trading houses, local and international retail chain stores, apparel brands and fashion labels, design studios, government bodies and trade associations, etc.
As a sourcing show, Intex South Asia intends to bring international suppliers to Sri Lanka. This will enable manufacturers of the country to get world class fabrics on time thus increasing our competitive edge globally.
