Our goal is to help you find the perfect factory to work with. There are a lot of considerations to make even outside of price. That’s why apparel island designed our factory profiles to include all the information you need to make an informed decision on which factories to reach out to. Here are the seven most important things you should look for in a Maker’s Row factory profile.
1. Capabilities
All factory profiles will feature these icons at the top of their profile and in detail in the menu. These are the six stages of the process. If a factory has the icon, then that means that they will be able to help you with that step of the process. This should be the first thing you look for in a Maker’s Row factory profile. Make sure that the factory has the capability to help you with the stage of product development that you are in. However, you have to make sure that you check out the detailed descriptions of what they can do for you at that stage of the process.
2. Visuals
Design and manufacturing are both very visual industries, that’s why looking for pictures or videos on a factory page are very important. This way, you can learn more about the owners and workers at a factory as well as viewing what their facilities look like.
3. Reference Samples
View some of the work that the factory has done in the past. This will give you an idea of their style and capabilities. This can also help you find references from people they have worked with in the past.
4. “Get A Quote” Button and “Accepts Maker’s Row Payments” Badge
Did you know that you can transact with factories on Maker’s Row? You can request quotes from factories and pay them securely if they have either a “Get A Quote” button or an “Accepts Maker’s Row Payments” badge.
5. The Blue Checkmark
Factories marked with a blue checkmark are Maker’s Row Preferred Factories. These factories have a proven track record of quality work and are specialists in their industry.
6. Reviews
Apparel manufacturer in pakistan are able to leave reviews for factories they’ve worked with. While nothing beats reaching out to actually references, reading reviews on profiles can give you a great overarching look into what it’s like to work with a factory.
7. Response Rate
Lastly, a simple but important feature on factory profiles is the response rate. This percentage is the number of messages that the factory has responded to. For a brand, it’s great to know whether or not a factory will answer your message. This article outlines what information to include to get a response!
3 Secrets to Scaling a Apparel Startup
Crystal Etienne joined co-founder and CMO Tanya Menendez for a Maker’s Row Live Q&A last week to answer your questions about starting an apparel line and scaling your business.
Last year, Crystal left a six-figure salaried career as a financial operations controller with no design or fashion background to write the patent for Panty Prop. She did not expect to become one of New York’s top three functional underwear so fast selling 15,000 units within one month of launch.
Now, Crystal has successfully released an underwear and swimwear line. She is currently working on her third venture: tights. Here are the top tips she has learned on her journey of launching and growing PantyProp.
WHY STREETWEAR?
Streetwear is having its moment. The confluence of hip hop, fashion, skater culture, and the popularity of street-style blogs has created a broad audience for new approaches to casualwear. In addition to finding streetwear relevant to current fashion trends, we liked its potential for being playful and offbeat. We wanted our brand to have a fun energy, and streetwear lent itself well to that.
WHY MADE IN USA?
Our clothing is made in Los Angeles by factories we found on Maker’s Row. From the beginning, having our clothes manufactured in places where we could reasonably expect fair labor practices was important to us. The revelations of the dire working conditions in countries like Bangladesh in the past several years only further crystallized our resolve.
As upstart designers, the geographic proximity of having our apparel made in California versus in other countries also appealed to us. The time for getting our finished goods to our warehouse in Long Island would be much shorter than having our merchandise traverse oceans by boat. Having domestic production also allowed us to communicate more easily with our vendors and visit their factories to help smooth out issues with production.
LESSONS LEARNED
The greatest takeaway that we’ve learned so far is to never underestimate the challenges inherent in the process of having a physical product manufactured. It goes without saying that much work is behind developing, sampling, and finally producing a satisfactory pair of pants or a sweatshirt, but we were naïve about the extent of the delays that we would experience as a result of hiccups in our manufacturing process.
Although we intended to launch last September, we found ourselves six months later still without all our inventory at our warehouse and unable to begin selling on our website. While these delays were frustrating, we were adamant that we wouldn’t accept inferior product. In the interim, we tried various strategies to help our factories tackle the issues that they were facing, including flying across the country to Los Angeles to meet with them and help audit the units they had produced. Sometimes a face-to-face meeting goes a long way in smoothing out any communication issues you may be having over the phone and email.