Hidden traps in manufacturing childrens clothing in China

Except for specialty boutique items, most children's clothing sold in the US is manufactured in either China, Vietnam or some other Asian country. If you are a children's clothing designer, you may be faced with competing product from these countries. Competition has become increasingly fierce as labor and raw material prices are rock bottom in China. You may be tempted to send your manufacturing to China in order to compete.

I am not against manufacturing in China. In fact, depending on your product, it may be the best option. The Chinese have become more skilled over time and can produce superior product. They can incorporate embroidery very cheaply, or produce complex pieces that many US factories balk at. If you are considering a move to China, you may want to read an article from Business Week (Nov 27, 2006), titled, Secrets, Lies, And Sweatshops and a book titled China, Inc.: How the Rise of the Next Superpower Challenges America and the World, by Ted Fishman.

Both this article and book detail the complexities of manufacturing in China. Clothing manufacturers will take advantage of you if you do not have enough money to protect your interests. They will bend over backwards to land the large volume accounts, like Wal-Mart, but not necessarily a small company. In other words, a small company can manufacture in China, but it must be done with a great deal of care and oversight. A small company can find factories willing to work with them, the difficulty is in finding an honest one. The same can be said about some of the remaining US and Mexico factories.

The greatest difficulty about manufacturing in China is quality control and worker efficiency. A Chinese factory would rather hire 5 employees for one job instead of buying a piece of equipment to perform that one operation. The owners are thinking only of short term solutions to get them through their current contract. Eventually those 5 workers will have to be replaced with a more efficient piece of equipment in order to compete effectively. I can see a time when Chinese workers will start to demand better working conditions and pay - it is only a matter of time.

Quality control is a huge issue. As I stated above, Chinese factories can produce superior product. Time constraints, the value of the contract, and the motivation of the factory all play a part. As the Business Week article suggests, inspecting the factories is the only current solution. And yet, parts of your product may be manufactured somewhere else and you will only see a part of it. If you do not have a person inspecting the product during manufacturing or prior to shipping, you may be stuck with sub-standard merchandise. Most, if not all, Chinese manufacturers require payment in full before shipping product. At least in this respect, the Chinese are different from their American counterparts.

I am not an expert in manufacturing in China. I have only experienced a small portion - creating technical specs to send to Chinese factories. And yet, this is an important trend for children's clothing designers to know about. I have seen some very good product come out of China. It can be done. Just be very careful and keep a close eye on your factory, sourcing agents, and product quality.

Creating a grading standard pt. 3

2019 notes - The original images for this blog entry have disappeared and I haven't had time to recreate them. I do have more complete examples in my ebook, The Organized Fashion Designer.  
 
I finally made my example measurement/grading charts. It took a little dancing as I had to create them in a spreadsheet, export them as a PDF and then convert them over to a jpg. Before I get too far, it may be helpful to review my previous blogs on grading: Creating a grading standard and Creating a grading standard part 2. You should have your own measurement charts handy. BTW, the measurements in my charts are real. I found them from the Sears website. I do not necessarily endorse Sears measurements as the industry standard - they were just handy (To be fair, their measurements are pretty good). Your own measurement charts should be far more complete and detailed than these for pattern development and actual grading anyway. This is the first step I take in developing actual grade rules.

Right off, I hope you notice a few important things. First, I have clearly marked my sample sizes. In this example they are sizes 10 and 10+. Each chart is labeled clearly. You would think these things should be obvious, but you would be surprised at what I have seen. Hanging off of the left side are numbers. These numbers are points of measure and should correspond to a How to Measure diagram (a future blog) and are not relevant for the immediate discussion. Also notice that my size ranges differ. The regular sizes run 7-16 and the plus sizes run 8+ to 18+. This is a fairly typical difference between the two groups. Also notice the difference in the measurements. There should be some obvious differences between a Misses and a Plus sizes chart too.

Usually, I have my grading chart separate from my measurement chart. I combined them here so you could more easily see how I am developing my grading rules. In the column for my sample sizes, I have placed a zero. A sample size is also called a base size in grading. It is your starting point and each subsequent size will grow or shrink proportionally off your base size. Next I subtract the difference between the base size and the next largest size. In the regular size chart, you will notice there is a 1.5" difference in the chest measurement from a size 10 to a size 12. This difference is called a grade step. Next I subtract the difference between a size 14 and a size 12. I don't subtract Size 14 from a size 10 because that is not the next grade step. Continue to subtract the next larger size with the previous size.

To calculate the grade for your smaller sizes, subtract your sample size from the next smaller size. Be sure to add the negative sign, which indicates the grade is getting smaller. Repeat by subtracting each size with the next smaller size. Create a grade for each measurement on your chart.

You will notice that the measurements and grades all have beautiful numbers. The measurements increase or decrease proportionally causing the grades between sizes to be relatively the same. This is where the art of grading and measurements come into play. I can guarantee that actual body measurements are not this pretty or consistent. These numbers have been averaged and rounded and are based on a large body measurement sampling. The numbers have been intentionally made easy to work with. Your measurements should be easy to work with too and you can adjust them as necessary.

What about accuracy? Rounding does introduce inaccuracies in your measurement charts, but only a little. If you look at growth charts, you will find that certain measurements will fit 50%, 80%, 95% or 97% of girls. If you adjust your numbers up or down, you will want to make sure those numbers fall into the 95% percentile. Adult measurements and sizing are similarly developed. Because these measurements are based off of measurement studies, it means a real girl will pick the size that most closely matches her measurements. Your measurement numbers just need to fall within the highest percentage category. You can round to the nearest 0.5" or 0.125", or whatever. Adjust your measurements so that you get a relatively consistent and even grade across the sizes. In my regular sizes I have a consistent 1.5" chest grade and a 2" grade for my plus sizes. Sure, you could throw in what ever grade steps you choose as long as you have justification for it.

Finally, I hope you can see the difference between the regular and plus sizes. Not only are plus size measurements larger, they are proportionally larger (the grade step is larger). This is why you absolutely cannot grade a plus size pattern from a regular sized pattern piece. Keep both categories, pattern pieces, measurements and grades separate from each other. I promise it will save your sanity.

I know this is a lot of explanation for this first step. If anyone has a question about this, just leave them in comments and I will try to answer them. In my next article in this series, I will explain how to create grade rules based off your first grading chart.

Tracking production with a numbering system

Every now and then it becomes necessary to know when and where previous production was made. This issue may come up when doing quality auditing or reviewing customer returns. If there is no tracking information included with a garment, it will be impossible to backtrack through manufacturing to correct problems. If you manufacture the same item multiple times and/or in different places, a tracking system becomes absolutely essential.

The best way to backtrack is to include either a cut number or modified style number on a care/content tag. Modifying a style number is the simplest method and may be best if you work with only a few factories and few cuts. Say you are cutting style #1001 and sending it to Bob's Contract Sewing, your style # could read BCS1001. This method works well if you cut one style at a few different places, one time.

If you manufacture t-shirts, you may need a more complex cut number assignment. Let's say your t-shirts are cut every month at three different locations. In this case, you will need to devise a cut numbering system. Start by assigning a number for each factory. Your cut number should incorporate the style number, factory, date, and some number. If we are working with style #1001, at factory 3, for the month of November, and this is the first cut of the month, the number may look something like this: 1001-03-1106-01. I added hyphens in this example so you could see each number designation. If this number is too long, some people separate the style number from the cut number:

Style: 1001
Cut: 3110601

It is not necessary to place the style and cut numbers on the care/content labels, but that is the most convenient place. These numbers are frequently placed at the bottom of the care/content tag just before the country of origin. Sometimes it is found on the reverse side of the labels or even on a separate label stuck into a side seam. Here is one example of including it on a care/content tag:

100% Cotton
Machine wash cold,
use non-chlorine
bleach as needed,
tumble dry,
low iron.
Size: 9M
Style: 1001
Cut: 3110601
Made in USA

I have seen a variety of cut numbering systems, so feel free to devise whatever method will work for you. Make sure to keep some kind of log in a spreadsheet or notebook. You can track what numbers have been used, what cuts have been sent and returned, etc. The most useful reason for assigning a cut number is to track problems back to a factory. If a customer returns something because a seam opened up, you can go back to the factory and alert them to this quality issue. Some factories keep very careful records of the operator and operation performed on a cut, so you can imagine how far you can back track and correct problems.

If you would like more examples, check out product in any major department store. You will see they require their vendors to incorporate a cut numbering system. It makes for a good industry practice.