Apparel Industry

Esquel, one of the leading cotton-shirt-manufacturers in the world came from China and it supplies lots of clothing brand such as Banana Republic, Tommy Hilfiger, Hugo Boss, Brooks Brothers, Abercrombie and Fitch, Nike, Nordstrom and Lands’ End, in addition to private companies (Plunkett Research, Ltd.). However, due to the high demand of the US apparel stores for Chinese products, the low cost, which was the main reason why raw materials are being purchased from China, have increased. China’s competition is huge, with Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia and Sri Lanka also producing material at cheap prices (Plunkett Research, Ltd.). The US apparel stores can instead purchase from these other Asian countries. It is hard to determine the exact number of suppliers in this industry; but, in general, majority of them are in Asian countries that can provide low-cost raw materials to US-based apparel stores. Therefore, the US apparel stores may acquire higher net profi

First of all, the amount of clothing in the United States that had been purchased from other countries has been increasing in great numbers. Most clothing in America was made in America until the 1970’s when clothing from outside countries started becoming more common. This happened because labor costs were much cheaper in other countries than in America, causing the products from those countries to also be much cheaper than those made in the United States and retailers were gaining better profits. The minimum wage in the United States is $7.26 per hour, while in China the average clothing factory worker earns $1.26 an hour and $0.52 in Cambodia. By 1990, of all the clothing sold in America, fifty percent were made in America- which has

Although the Chinese apparel manufacturers would lose profitability due to rising cotton prices and competition from emerging countries, they stand to gain the most from the removal of U.S. quotas and tariffs. According to the author, in 2007, 95% of the 20 billion garments Americans made were purchased overseas. Due to U.S. trade barriers, China’s share of the U.S. apparel import was only 30%. Once these barriers were removed, Chinese apparel would flood the American market due to their low cost and dominance in garment manufacturing. Experts predict that China could eventually supply 85% of U.S. apparel. As they increase their market share in the

Fifty years ago almost all clothes sold in the U.S. were made here. Now almost 98% of the clothes sold here are made in other countries. For big retailers like Walmart, and Forever 21 they are able to sell clothes at low prices due to clothes being produced in other nation “where labor and other costs are less expensive,” as stated in “The Real Cost of Fashion.” How this works? Well, an example from “The Real Cost of Fashion.” Says, “For example, it costs $3.72 to manufacture a denim shirt in Bangladesh. To make that same shirt in the U.S. costs $13.22. Lower costs mean U.S. stores can sell clothes for less and still make a profit. For U.S. shoppers, it means more clothes in their closets and more money in their wallets to buy other things.” But three years ago, a tragedy occurred in a building in Bangladesh. 1,127 workers died while about 2,500 workers were injured when the building collapsed. This building contained five factories which made clothes to sell in the U.S. and Europe. Officials then discovered the owner of the building illegally added more floors and let the companies place heavy gear that the building wasn’t sturdy enough to support. According to “The Real Cost of Fashion,” Bangladesh’s government “temporarily closed about 20 factories for safety violations. It also announced plans to raise the country’s minimum wage. Bangladesh has some of the lowest-paid workers in the world.” They get paid less than $2 day. It

Our need for cheap clothing in the US has been the drive for sweatshops overseas. John Quelch wrote of the incident that happened on April 24, 2013. The Rana Plaza factory building was in such a poor state that it collapsed with workers in side. He states in his article Rana Plaza: Bangladesh Garment Tragedy, “Low cost production and large capacity were key incentives for multinational corporations (MNCs) to produce garments in Bangladesh” (Quelch 2). Because labor there was so cheap it was easy to make cheap clothing. He also stated that about “90% of garments produced in Bangladesh were exported to the United States, Europe and Canada” (Quelch p2). This sweatshop was producing clothing that was cheap for the US. The more we crave disposable

* We are doing this report so that we can analysis the readymade garment (RMG) sector of Bangladesh and find out the problems and remedies of this sector.

The problem African textile manufacturers have, is that they are fighting an uphill battle against costs. As manufactures must pay for the materials, the facilities, the equipment, power and personnel, international dealers pay for the bales of clothing and all the associated shipping costs. For example, 300 bales of second hand clothing are sold for $40k in the African market (Hoskins,2013). A bale consists of 200 to 250 pieces of clothing on average (Rogali). The bales are stripped down and the clothing is

The clothing manufacturing abilities and skills are really advanced and are still fairly cheaper than the United States fashion labels. With China’s production cost now starting to go up, American brands are starting to investigate other possibilities such as Vietnam, India, Indonesia and the United States also. Companies do offshore production because they believe that it is cheaper to make things in poorer countries. They feel that if you want lower prices you go overseas were they use cheap labor and if you want garments made of better quality, you should stay in the United States. But this is not entirely true, there’s certain kinds of clothing that are made in the U.S. of good quality at a very reasonable price and there’s other clothing that’s not.

Textiles consist of forty percent apparel, forty percent home fashion, and twenty percent industrial use. In my opinion, the apparel percentage is the most interesting use of textiles. Apparel tends to be the most relevant topic considering the role it plays in our lives. It is responsible for the protection of our bodies as well as our individual fashion. We are able to express who we are through our apparel and that is just one of the numerous reasons it is significant. Taking a look at the fashion of each year, it has evolved. For example, during the 1920’s men and women would only wear suits and dresses. When compared to the current year of 2016, the evolution of apparel over the last few decades is evident.

The majority of clothing manufacturing resides within Asia, Central America and South America. In these regions there are risks associated with

Apparel industry in Sri Lanka has become one of the most important contributors to Sri Lanka’s GDP. In fact, the industry has grown enormously well during the past 3 decades bring opportunities for locals, internationals, and organizations. Moreover, Sri Lanka apparel industry has definitely helped the country’s development in numerous ways.

According to the data, the total volume of textiles exported from China has started a continuous rapid growth since 2001 (the year of China’s accession to the WTO) as shown in the first graph above, which roughly

Base on the first assessment, refer to the PESTEL and Porter’s 5 Forces analysis (Appendix 6.1), the most attractiveness in China is the point of huge increasing population which have recorded 1,370,536,875 (National Bureau of Statistics of China 2012) on 2011. And as one of the BRIC countries, China has also recorded a 7.4% of GDP growth rate in 2012 (Trading Economics 2012), which is an evidence showing China is a strong emerging market. Regard to the technology used, China has relatively lower penetration rate than the other two countries. But operating business in China has a lower cost than the other two countries, example as the labour cost.

Textile production and consumption is an increasingly global affair as production continues to shift to developing countries. Developing countries have seen an explosion in the growth of their textile

Faruqui, M. (2014, July). Nobody can beat Bangladesh in price and quality. Retrieved from http://www.textiletoday.com.bd/magazine/873