Fabric sourcing plays a critical role in the development of great product and building a profitable clothing business.
In a large organization, different departments care about different aspects of the fabric. My guess is you’re wearing most, if not all, the hats. You’re the VP of design, development, sourcing, marketing and operations! Whoa! So, what should you consider beyond look and feel when searching for the perfect new fabric? Read on to learn the eight things the pros ask when sourcing a new fabric.
1. Minimums
Your biggest fabric souring issue when you start out tends to be minimums. Am I right? Just like you, fabric suppliers are more efficient when they can sell at large volumes. This means that sometime, a supplier won’t sell you fabric if the quantity doesn’t help them hit a break even point.
Think about the extra time and cost it takes you to process each of your orders individually. Your fabric supplier is in the same boat.
There is additional cost every time they need to set up their machinery for a new fabric, set up dying for a new colour and inspect and package each order. This is why some fabric suppliers only deal in large volumes, up to 1000 yards. Their model is to offer a competitive cost because they are able to leverage efficiency in production.
But, there are some suppliers who’s model is to serve smaller designers. What you have to understand is that this does come at a higher cost. This makes sense though since these suppliers can’t be as efficient. That higher cost associated with a loss of efficiency gets passed on to you. Most often, this is a small price to pay for being able to get the minimums you need for your startup business. And look at the upside. When your volumes go up, your prices will come down. Yay!
Also, don’t forget to ask what the minimum order per colour is. This is generally even less than the minimum by material.
2. Location
If you are working with a local fabric salesperson that is offering you low minimums, chances are, your fabric is being produced in one country and warehoused in another.
This offers the fabric supplier the ability to get a reduced cost by buying in high volumes and then piecing that out in smaller orders to designers like you.
So where is your fabric coming from? For a small business, this might actually be a two part questions.
Where is your fabric manufactured?
It’s important to know where your fabric is being manufactured so that you can meet your product labeling requirements and so that you can calculate and process the correct duty rates.
Where is your fabric shipped from?
It’s also important to know where you fabric is being warehoused. Sometimes this is the same place but, if your quantities are small it often isn’t. Where your fabric is warehoused is an important piece in your supply chain puzzle.
Here’s something to consider. If you’re producing your product in Asia, does buying fabric warehoused in Italy make sense? Probably not. Speaking from experience the cost, time and logistical nightmare of moving material around the world is not worth it.
Fabric sourcing 101, try to find fabric and garment suppliers that have a geographical relationship that make sense.
3. Lead Time
Depending on who you work with the lead time for your fabric can vary hugely! Be prepared for this and ask this question in your first meeting.
If you are buying your fabric from a sales rep that has access to locally warehoused fabric, the lead time will probably be quick. A week or two tops.
On the other hand, if you’re working with a supplier in Asia that is manufacturing fabric specifically for you, the lead times can be up to 120 days depending on the level of complexity.
You will also want to take into account how long it takes to ship fabric to you or to the factory that will be sewing for you. Remember the Italian fabric shipping to Asia that I called out above? Yeah, you don’t need to add an additional 30 days to your production time.
4. Shipping cost
Location is going to be a huge driver in your cost to ship your fabric. If you’re super small and your fabric is warehoused locally you can go pick it up! Amazing. When you’re starting out every penny counts.
As you get bigger, you’ll be working with suppliers in different locations and at higher volumes. That’s when you need to start thinking about what the final cost of getting your fabric to your doorstep is.
Sometimes, it makes sense to buy your fabric from a local warehouse for a slightly higher cost per yard because you can save on the cost of shipping that fabric. Air freight rates are REALLY high and shipping on a boat can take an extremely long time and a huge level of effort if you aren’t set up to handle the logistics. What initially looks like a higher cost might be a pretty good deal when you lift up the covers.
5. Content
The content of your fabric plays a role in determining how much duty you pay. In general, Canada has this pretty simplified with most apparel garments having an 18% duty rate, unless they are coming from a duty free country. The US, on the other hand, is much more varied.
Let’s look at an example. Importing a knit COTTON dress into the US requires a payment of 11.5% duty whereas a knit SILK dress would only be 0.9%. That might have something to do with the fact that a knitted silk is super uncommon, but you get the picture. Fabric content matters. It pays to know this going into the product creation process since it will have a large impact on your LDP (landed duty paid cost) and your margin. For more about this, check out my post on calculating your product margin here.
For more details on specific duty rates check out:
Canada Boarder Services Online – for Canadian Duty Rates
US International Trade Commission – for US Duty Rates
6. Care Instructions
This is one that I have seen people take for granted. They fall in love with the look and soft hand feel of a modal knit and can’t get over how wonderful it would feel on a baby’s soft skin. Then, six months later, they are bombarded with poor customer feedback because sleepy moms keep throwing their baby pants in the dryer and instead of baby clothes they have doll clothes. Lame.
Don’t just do the bare minimum and tell your customers how to care for their garments. Build garments for them that suit their lifestyle. PSA- moms don’t hang to dry their baby’s clothes.
7. Price
So this is probably already on your radar but here are a couple of variables within the price that I want to make sure you are aware of.
One: What is the fabric’s cuttable width?
This means, how much of that fabric width is actually usable?Depending on the type of fabric this can vary greatly and impacts how much it costs. For example, a fabric with all over embroidery, often has a narrow cuttable width since the embroidery machine won’t go all the way to the edge of the fabric. This mean that there is less usable fabric, more waste, a larger yield per garment and a higher cost to you.
I have also found myself tricked by a low price on something only to go to cut it and realize it is half the width of a standard fabric. The fabric that I passed over because it was $1 more per yard starts to look like a much better option at that point. Unfortunately, it’s too late.
Two: Are you being quoted the price in meters or yards?
In the US, sales reps often quote fabric prices in yards. The rest of the world usually quotes in meters. Annoyingly, sometimes a supplier that should work in meters is so used to working with US customers that they start quoting in yards. Either way, it’s good to clarify this up front. This will help you get accurate costing and make sure you are ordering the correct amount for sampling and production.
Three: What currency is the price being quoted in?
Whether you are buying that fabric in US or Canadian dollars can make a big difference to your bottom line so take this into account up front.
8. Performance
With the increase in popularity of athleisure there has also been an increase in the availability of performance fabrics. If you are sourcing a material that is popular with performance brands, there may be performance characteristics already built in. If they support what you are trying to deliver to your customer, great. If you don’t need the performance you might want to see if it is available without it.
Here’s an example. You want a mesh for a pocket bag and you find one that was originally developed for a technical product. You discover it has a wicking finish to support drawing moisture away from the body. But do you need that? Probably not. Go ahead and ask your supplier if they have a version without the finish. If
they do, you should be able to get it for a better cost.
On the flip side, if you are developing a technical product, make sure that you’re getting the performance characteristics that you need. And get the testing to back it up.
9. Stock Colours
Last one. Promise! So, if you happen to be working with a supplier that is warehousing fabric, you’re going to want to ask them for what colours they hold stock in.
Black and white are pretty standard but often they can give you some thing called a colour card. These are great and if you can take one home with you, even better! A colour card will show you all of the colours that they have available in a given fabric. This is a great way for you to infuse colour into your line without having to buy into huge minimums to dye your own colours. Yay!
Whoa- that’s a lot of information right? Yeah. I know. That’s why I’ve created a quick little cheat sheet that you can store in your seasonal fabric binder so that you always have it with you. Yay!
Head over to the FREE Resource Library to download the Fabric Sourcing Checklist.
Happy sourcing!
