Monsoon is set to open more stores next year after a recovery in profitability and a return to high street shopping.

Based in the UK, the retailer now plans to open another 22 stores in the current financial year. Monsoon followed a strategy of product and brand renewal, digital transformation, retail portfolio restructuring, international restructuring, and central cost reduction and the strategy contributed ahead of expectations. The group is even confident of reaching the 200 store mark, if it wanted to.

Across the group, e-commerce sales make up 45 per cent of the total, up from around 20 per cent before the Covid pandemic hit. The proportion of e-commerce sales at Monsoon is much higher than at its sister brand Accessorize, where most sales are still made in stores. Over the past two years the company worked tirelessly to save the business, return it to a solid footing and secure its long-term future. The priority was to save the business, secure over 2,300 UK jobs and maintain its presence as a leader on the high street, which has been done.

Retail is doing great at the moment in the UK. The strength of the return to stores after a big pivot to e-commerce during the pandemic has surprised and delighted retailers.

Vietnam is forging partnerships with Luxembourg, the Netherlands and Belgium.

Trade between Vietnam and Luxembourg has risen 60 per cent over a year earlier. As of October 2022, Vietnam’s exports to the country were up 50 per cent year on year while imports were up 11 per cent. Vietnam mostly exports garment and footwear products to Luxembourg while importing fiber and chemicals from the country.

The Netherlands is one of the leading trade partners of Vietnam as it is a gateway to the EU and one of the largest logistics centers in the region. Trade between Vietnam and the Netherlands has increased about six per cent each year. The Netherlands is the sixth largest export market of Vietnam and the biggest among the EU members.

Belgium is the sixth largest European trade partner of Vietnam. Before Covid broke out, two-way trade would risesix to ten per cent each year. After a fall of ten per cent in 2020, the growth rate surged to 53 per cent in 2021. Vietnam is Belgium’s supplier of footwear, garment products, coffee and aquatic products. Meanwhile, Belgium provides Vietnam with pharmaceuticals, gems, machineries and equipment.Belgium has high demand for agro-fisheries products and traditional handicrafts, which are Vietnam’s strengths.

Massive volumes of contraband textile enter Iran every year and hamper local production.

Smuggled products make up around 25 per cent of Iran’s annual apparel market.Presently, the lion’s share of apparel smuggled into Iran are off-season brands sold at discounted prices that happen to be even lower than the production cost and that of the raw materials combined with price tags no one can compete with.

There has been a 18 per cent rise in smuggling of textile industry products into Iran the last fiscal yearcompared to the year before. Import of apparel into Iran has been banned for many years now.There has been an apparent decline in the value of Iran’s apparel market. The declining purchasing power of average Iranians and the Covid pandemic to a lesser extent have been cited as the reasons for the decline. Manufacturers want support and urgent measures to combat contraband apparel in the market.

A total of 900 million square meters of textile are imported into Iran every year. Close to 3.6 billion square meters of different kinds of textile are consumed in the country annually, some 2.7 billion square meters of which are produced domestically and the rest has to be imported.

Sri Lanka is moving toward creating a set of positive incentives that will encourage voluntary repatriation of exporters’ income and conversion in line with global standards and practices.

Of the exports in September 2022 and October 2022, the country’s exporters repatriated or brought 100 per cent of their export earnings back into the banking system.

However, exporters may be utilizing dollars for approved local purchases. These would include the purchase of both diesel and domestically produced raw materials which are required for the industry.Given the current economic milieu in the country, companies use a considerable portion of export proceeds to purchase raw materials, fuel and other items essential for seamless operations in the event of unforeseen crises.

In the case of the apparel sector, the industry refers to a local value addition of 50 per cent. About 25 per cent of export proceedings on an average have been directly converted to rupees by the exporters. Under the existing regulations, exporters are permitted to make outward payments for purchases of raw materials and the remaining proceeds are converted automatically by the respective commercial banks on the seventh day of the following month.In addition to payments made to overseas suppliers, the growth of the local supply chain also means that apparel companies can pay up to 25 per cent of their inward foreign currency remittances to indirect exporters in Sri Lanka.

Trident’s production of bath linen declined seven per cent in November 2022 as compared to November 2021.

Production of bed linen dropped 35 per cent. Production of yarn tumbled 24 per cent. Production of paper fell six per cent in November 2022 compared with that in November 2021. Production of chemicals fell three per cent in November 2022 as against the same period a year ago.

Based in Punjab, Trident is a vertically integrated textile (yarn, bath and bed linen) and paper (wheat straw-based) manufacturer and is one of the largest players in the home textile space in India. The company operates in two major business segments, textiles and paper, with its manufacturing facilities located in Punjab and Madhya Pradesh.

The three keys for Trident’s product introductions are utility, comfort and sustainability.From using fibers made from recycled materials to making products with the finest cottons like Supima and Egyptian, Trident has been constantly raising the bar year after year. Trident is launching several new categories of product in bed and bath. In addition, the company has temperature-regulating sheets and a bath assortment featuring its patented Air Rich technology, which helps create towels that stay soft wash after wash.

Shein has moved beyond selling its own brand apparel and into a marketplace platform that will enable other merchants to sell directly to customers.

Shein is one of the world’s largest online fashion retailers. The marketplace platform makes available a range of additional merchandise and shipping options, and the company expects it to result in increased customer engagement and satisfaction though creating a marketplace would put Shein in more direct competition with e-commerce giants at a time when retailers globally are seeing growth slow amid economic uncertainty and weakened consumer spending in some markets.

Shein currently sells and ships products to more than 150 countries and carries pricier clothes such as evening gowns as well as household goods.The fast-growing company, now based in Singapore, is also diversifying its supply chain away from China, where Shein was founded. It has started manufacturing in Turkey and has leased and operated warehouses in Poland to store merchandise and ship to customers in western Europe. The company’s supply chain is largely rooted in a major manufacturing hub in China, where it has a network of more than 3,000 suppliers.

Shein has grown rapidly into one of the world’s top online retailers based on a business model offering a large assortment of apparel at ultralow prices tracking quickly shifting fashion trends.

IHGF will be held in New Delhi, March 15to19, 2023.

The edition will be structured with a larger display of over 3,000 exhibitors, themes as well as collective displays, several curated lines and design affirmations with a cross section of exhibitors ranging from medium and small exporters, artisan entrepreneurs and designers to India’s leading manufacturer-exporters. A choice of over 2000 products and more than 300 trend specific design developments across 14 display segments defines this show.

The product range will feature housewares, home furnishing, furniture, gifts and decorative, lamps and lighting, Christmas and festive décor, fashion jewellery and accessories, spa and wellness, carpets and rugs, bathroom accessories, garden accessories, educational toys and games, handmade paper products and stationery, candles, cases and leather bags.Collectively they will offer a full spectrum of thoughtfully curated concepts and products at a single platform.

The five-day fair is a sustained, proven and progressive resource for importers, wholesalers, retail chains and design professionals.Added attractions like theme pavilions, trend areas, craft demonstrations, ramp presentations, knowledge seminars, buyer lounges and refreshment zones would make attending the show a truly wholesome experience.

The event is being organized by the Export Promotion Council for Handicrafts (EPCH).

Michelle Weisse is the vice president of the textile and apparel department at Fashion Fabrics of America.

She comes to FFA after many years in the textile industry. Her experience spans all areas of the apparel industry from the factory floor to concept, design, garment production and execution of apparel fabrics and garments.

Her experience is expected to help FFA better understand how events of the past made things the way they are today, enable FFA to better navigate today’s supply chain and avoid prior mistakes and allowit to more positively impact clients’ bottom lines.

Fashion Fabrics of America offers many different types of styled fabrics to the New York and Los Angeles women’s apparel market and also services the men’s and children’s apparel markets. Its goal is to work cooperatively with apparel makers from all over the United States and to not sell any imported fabrics. Fashion Fabrics of America is a one stop mill-direct textile resource offering knits, wovens, novelties, pieced dyed and printed textiles. The in-house design provides aid in any way necessary at no additional charge from print design projects to dye-lot overview. Garment packages are available.

Fashion Fabrics of America is an entirely American mill-direct textile resource offering a variety of textiles from dressy to athletic fabrics.

India and the UK are continuing their negotiations on the Free Trade Agreement (FTA).

They are targeting a deal to cut tariffs and open opportunities for UK services, such as financial and legal, making it easier for British businesses to sell to an economy set to be the world’s third largest by 2050.

India and the UK are the fifth and the sixth biggest economies in the world, have a long shared history and are in pole position to do a deal that will create jobs, encourage growth and boost their trading relationship. Strong growth in the Indian economy is expected to boost UK exports to India massively by the middle of the next decade and UK businesses are already taking advantage of the flourishing trading relationship.

Already Tirupur’s exports of knitwear and garments to the United Kingdom are growing by 20 per cent year on year.And with the India-United Kingdom Free Trade Agreement in the offing, exports from Tirupur could see a ten per cent growth. Britain is interested in expanding its footprint in the financial sector in India and in projecting London as the first choice for Indian companies raising global finance, so a deal involving financial markets is important for Britain.

Kering and L’Occitane have teamed up to create a Climate Fund for Nature.

Kering is a global luxury group. L’Occitane is a premium and sustainable cosmetics company. The fund will mobilize resources from the luxury fashion and beauty sectors to protect and restore nature, with a particular focus on women empowerment. The fund will be open to new partner companies to support the scaling up of its positive impacts on the ground.The creation of the fund will bring significant capital to nature protection and restoration. The fund vehicle will start operations as of the first quarter of 2023.

With the objective of supporting high-quality projects dedicated to nature protection and restoration, the fund will also support farmers in their transition to regenerative practices, deliver carbon credits, and generate co-benefits for the communities with a specific emphasis on women empowerment. This means the projects supported will also be required to significantly contribute to women empowerment by addressing existing gaps related to access to finance, land and training. Eligible projects will mostly take place in countries where the investors source their core raw materials.As countries and companies step up their commitments to fight the climate and biodiversity crises, the need to scale-up finance and investment in nature-based solutions is now acknowledged as critical.