Fashion business information, advice, guidance, and education for fashion brands
A good fit is obviously a result of a good pattern, but you will be surprised to learn how much impact your fitting sessions can have on how quick you will get there and how good and consistent your fit will be.
Not to mention how much money it will save you!
I have been part of hundreds of fitting sessions during my career and I'm always surprised to see how quick a fitting session can go wrong.
You have probably noticed it on some garments that you bought.
It is a number, usually somewhere on the care labels, most likely with the letters RN# before it. As in the picture below.
An RN number or registered identification number is a number issued by the FTC (Federal Trade Commission), upon request, to a business residing in the U.S. and engaged in the manufacture, importing, distribution, or sale of textile, wool, or fur products.
Deciding whether to produce your fashion product offshore or domestically goes beyond the reasons of cost and number of units you will need to produce.
As a matter of fact it's a decision that will impact how your business is set up and operates to best fit that scenario, re; what kind of people/services you should hire and even the details of your designs.
As a start-up fashion brand, costing your product for the first time is one of the most challenging parts of your fashion business.
When you source a factory you will have their costs for making both a small run of your product (i.e. 50 units) and a bigger run (i.e. 200+ units). For many designers, the first season is experimental and you might not know exactly how many orders you will get. So the big question is: Should you price your product based on the cost of a small run or the cost of a big run?
Today’s post offers 4 tips to help you get the best results out of your pattern maker.
Knowing what to provide and how to direct your pattern maker is crucial to how well can they execute your vision. Whether you are a veteran or new to the industry the following should make your pattern maker job easier and will make you look like a pro not to mention save you time and money:
One of the most common mistakes we see with young designers is grading a pattern too early in the development process.
At what stage of the process should you grade your apparel pattern?
First, let’s explain what grading is:
Grading is the stage of sizing an apparel pattern up or down to create the patterns for the other sizes of that garment.
PaperGirl is a brightly illustrated and inspiring made in NY childrenswear line that our company manged the development and production for this past year before launching their first collection in April 2015!
The stunning original artwork that make up each print on the garments, coordinates with a booklet (also designed and written by the designer) stored inside the garment’s pocket to inspire its little wearers to dream as individuals. Here we meet the designer behind the imaginative brand to hear her unique story:
Ever wondered how the New York Garment District got its start? What happened to it and where it is heading?
In the Mid 19th century, New York City’s Garment District was built on ready to wear clothing that was mass produced and mass-marketed. The industry relied on the workings of a cheap yet skilled labor force—primarily immigrants of European Jewish and Italian descent who arrived in the United States trained in traditional tailoring.
During this time the garment industry was New York City’s largest employer, employing one hundred thousand people each year. Rapid growth was seen in twenty years when the amount of manufacturing firms increased from 562 in 1880 to over 1,800 in the 1900s.
In an effort to increase New York City’s shopping culture Fashion Row and Ladies Mile were
You have a great concept, you have the backing and the drive, but all of these things can’t make a line successful if it doesn't ship on time.
One of the biggest pitfalls for designers is staying on schedule and making their deliveries on time. It’s a struggle to design, produce, ship and sell on time, especially for designers who are learning how the fashion calendar works. The industry has standard dates that are predetermined for designers to follow as guidelines:
- Fabric shows – when the season’s fabrics become available
- Sales shows – when the current season collection is presented to stores
- Store delivery dates – when stores accept orders
How you organize your time before and in between these industry dates will make or break
As a designer, it is very important your collection is well executed for a show, presentation and market week, as well as the selling floor. And to have a well-made collection, or just a single garment, it starts after your designs are finalized and it’s ready for construction.
Most fashion houses already have their team of sewers who understands the design concept and know how each garment should be constructed, with some instructions given. However, majority of young designers don’t have the same resources. When they find a sewer or factory to sew their garments, young designers would think that this person would understand their design because of years of experience the sewer has under their belt. This is actually a BIG misconception. If no instructions given, the sewer can have a garment finished in a way that you originally did not want. This mistake would cost time and money.
When you give a new design to a sewer/factory, you should think ahead about the steps they
Your selling season just ended, your got orders (hopefully more than what was projected), Congratulations! So what now? What should you do next?
This next preparation stage can help iron out and clean any possible issues before you commit to production. This is where you will need to consolidate all your orders, confirm them, make production decisions and start the pre-production phase.
Here is a detailed step by step on what you should do now:
Collecting - Collect all your orders, go through all the details on each one of them to make sure all the info on them is clear and complete. Many times orders are being
When developing a product or collection from scratch it’s easy to start designing and planning without first considering the importance of how you’ll communicate your designs to the team that will help bring your vision to life. A tech pack is the fashion industry’s universal form that explains all the details and specs for each garment. Before getting too far into the design process, consider these three important reasons how a tech pack will help your business:
Choosing an appropriate size range for your apparel products will usually have more impact on your branding than what you might think, especially if FIT is high on your list of priorities for brand identity. The available sizes you decide to offer can send a message to whom you see as your target customer and what market you are going after.
When it comes to apparel there are two standard size ranges:
This week I read a very informative article on manufacturing and production and it made me think: “What is the single most important step to get the best results from your production? “
I once had a teacher who said that if we simply do our homework and study, the test will be a breeze! And he was right, it worked for me. The same concept easily translates to fashion production.
DESIGN WITH PRODUCTION IN MIND! I know how boring and limiting this part sounds for a creative person like you, but following this motto is the single, most important step to turn your creativity and talent into a BUSINESS! If you plan your production process while you design your product and think ahead about each step, re: the logistics, the cost, the timeline, etc. your production will be easy and will have no tricky questions or surprises.
To help you with that, here are 3 tips you should follow when designing your next season:
This is a question that we frequently get from designers, so I figured you would benefit from the answer as well.
Q. What is the skinny on bar/UPC codes? And do I need to have that on my products/hangtags?
A. To answer the question, first, let me explain what a UPC code is and why it is used.
A UPC, Universal Product Code, is a bar code that encodes product information (company, product style, size, color, etc.) in a visual pattern that can be read electronically. For example, retailers with an electronic point of sale system at the checkout use UPCs to keep track of their stock, sales and reorder products by scanning the bar code.
Spring 2015 market is just around the corner, how is the sample making process going for you so far? Hopefully your collection is coming well and on time. A major next step for you is pricing your products right to make sure you are making a profit. So as you are getting your cost sheets ready and to help you avoid this bad experience here are 5 points to consider while costing and pricing your fashion line:
Many of you designers out there are probably going into Fall14 production & SS15 samples as we speak and trying to finalize your sewing contractor—choosing one and making it work with them.
As a start-up fashion brand with limited resources, you might be hesitant that the sewing contractor will not have your business as priority; In other words, “doing you a favor” by accepting your job. Considering your budget is probably limited and your quantities are barely make their minimums, you start to wonder: What incentives can I offer them to consider my line a valid brand and want to work with me?
My business philosophy has always been that a business interaction must make sense for both sides in order to last. It must be a win-win situation! Unfortunately, many fashion designers get too involved with their own views and business needs/deadline/pressure and end up waiting until the last minute to place orders, and then ask the contractor to rush without having all the materials and info ready, (not to mention asking for lower production price), etc. At the end of the day, this makes it not profitable and very difficult for the contractors to work with young designers.
Here are 3 valuable things that you, as a new brand with limited resources, can offer your sewing contractor to make this a win-win relationship:
Let's take a second to talk about the feasibility of your fashion business.
Before you jump all in to execute your vision it is really important for you to do your homework and find out how feasible your idea is.
Yes lots of times you will need the help of industry professionals which is where we can help, but even before that there is market research that you can probably can and should do on your own that will answer that question.
I thought the best way for me to address this subject will be to share an example of a general conversation that i often have with a designer on a feasibility consultation session.
