China has been dominating the textile industry scene for over 2 decades. The low cost , high volume model of Chinese manufacturing did wonders for the Chinese economy as well as enabled the retailers worldwide to provide cheap clothing to their consumers year after year. It also enabled China to create huge clusters of textile and garment manufacturing – eg Xintang – which is supposed to be producing and processing over 1 billion mtrs of denim ! However, all is not so well in China ...Read More

Tags: china denim

An interesting article on Wall Street Journal explores how the premium denim labels cost $300 or more. For those who buy $50 jeans from Levi’s , it is at many times unpalatable to see that the jeans are priced at $300 +. The market had started moving  in a direction since early 2000’s when a  good amount of manufacturing started happening in the US. A True Religion jeans which costs $50 in US can end up being wholesaled at $150 and retailed at $335!!  The margins in the ...Read More

Tags: denim prices

Pakistan had always strong textile industry due to historical reasons and an abundance of cotton . With over 380 million mtrs produced and over 150 million mtrs of denim fabrics being exported by Pakistan in 2009-10 , denim is probably the most imp segment of the Pakistani textile industry. In a recent report  Dr Noor Ahmed Memon from Pakistan mentions that top global denim fabric exporting countries are China, followed by Hong Kong, Turkey, Italy, Pakistan, the USA, India, Japan, ...Read More

Tags: pakistan denim exports

  There has been a fall in demand of denim apparel in US and even the EU in the last 6 months.  The fall in demand and hence imports to US had started setting in the last quarter of 2010 itself and is continuing since then.  Lets look at the figures of denim exported by two important exporting countries to the US in the first quarter of 2011.   Country Year/ quarter Total Denim Apparel (pcs) Total Value (in USD) Average Price ( USD/pc) Change in qty. over last ...Read More

Tags: denim buying

We all know that cotton prices have been killing the textile industry till a few months back . The unrelenting rise in the price of cotton had led to the increase in fabric prices for most of the garment factories and hence ultimate buyers.  The fabric prices were increased by almost each denim mill and sometimes to the tune of 50% or more .  The apparel buyers  and retailers had no option but to bear the increased costs. However, the prices at the retail level in the ...Read More

Tags: US Denim Imports

The retailers worldwide are resorting to increases in prices to make up for the increased costs – most of which have been attributed to the increase in cotton prices. Though the cotton prices have started to ease, the impact on the supply chain will be visible for some time to come.  As previously mentioned , GAP announced its forecast of reduced earnings leading to the largest fall of share price in over a decade . Businessweek now reports that the apparel brands are finding that ...Read More

Tags: denim prices

The denim players have seen some tough times in the last 1 and half years. With the cotton prices going through the roof (having almost doubled), the mills were  previously hard pressed to make their buyers understand the increase in costs and tried to get the prices increased. The process was slow as getting sharp increases in prices from buyers is never too easy. However, the awareness of the cotton price increase was there among buyers and many of them , reluctantly , agreed to ...Read More

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As we mentioned in our previous report on last quarter imports in 2010 , the denim apparel import continues to fall in the first 2 months of 2011. The fall is not small  -at about 6.3% – compared to the same period  in 2010. The fall is even more when one considers that the last quarter of 2010 , the imports had fallen by 6.8% . Period 2009 2010 2011 Fall % Oct – Dec 157 million pcs 148 million pcs   -6.8% Jan – Feb   74.5 million pcs 69.8 million ...Read More

Tags: US Denim Imports

This is a guest article by Robert Antoshak – Managing Director , Olah Inc. This week, cotton futures prices topped $2.00 per pound. A year or so ago, the big debate in the cotton world was whether cotton could reach the history-setting level of a $1.00 per pound. How things can change! For jeans and denim companies, the recent run up in cotton prices has significantly impacted costs and at a time when consumer demand remains uncertain in the U.S. and elsewhere. So how did this shortage ...Read More

Tags: denim prices

The era of Cheap Chinese denim is over – says a report by Telegraph , UK. The rising labour costs in China coupled with the effect of Cotton price is killing the Chinese denim exports. The retailers who had a great time buying very cheap denim and retailing them as low as $5 – $10 will now have to shelve out much more amounts to get similar quantity . Xintang , the Denim capital of the world – with over 260 million pieces of denim production and a very large quantity of jeans ...Read More

Tags: china denim