Fashion analysts including McKinsey believe brands and retailers, who successfully navigate through COVID-19 crisis, will drive new online customer experiences, product information transparency and seamless payments and delivery. In a recent article ‘The fashion market needs a reset’ published in MobileMarketing Mike Owen says, for such brands data will become an important medium to create a single analytics platform to improve decision-making on core processes as planning, buying, promotions, markdowns, and in-season inventory management.

McKinsey’s latest survey had shown, though customers are buying more through online channels, brands need to create a new vision to attract them and providing accurate product information data can be ones of the ways to achieve this.

Adapting to changing consumer behavior

In his article Owen says post-COVID, fashion consumers are likely to spend more through mobile channels. Hence, brands need to customize their product assortment, values and their medium of sale. Retailers also need to be careful about store and product selection and align it with local data and customer preferences and an omnichannel presence.

In addition, brands will have to improve their supply chain partnerships and flexibility. They would have to update or expand their websites besides consolidating their partnerships with back-end manufacturers and marketplace platforms such as Amazon and Alibaba.

Being transparent

In its report on the influence of ‘woke’ among GenZ, McKinsey states a majority of Generation Z consumers hold companies responsible for addressing environmental and social issues. They will keep a close watch on companies’ commitment to their social campaigns and their strategic and operational decisions. For consumers, a company’s product and operational transparency will hold greater importance.

Henceforth, consumption will become more need-based as consumers will be more cautious about the products they buy. They will prefer to buy products that are ‘must have’ instead of ‘nice to have’.

Futurists like Doug Stephens advise brands to use this time to reinvent operations and offer more alternatives and values to customers. They can also use cross-functional teams to break down siloes and prioritize on customer experience and data management. Owen argues post COVID, product information and knowledge will play a greater role in attracting shoppers. Consumers will be drawn by accurate and detailed product information visible in every sales channel.

Brands can integrate their product information management with new tech investment to seamlessly curate information for digital and wholesale showrooms. They can explore applications such as livestreaming, digital store assistants (WeChat), and virtual sampling to improve their interaction with customers and present their products in real-time. To achieve this, brands need to reduce their supplier costs, increase flexibility, decrease time to market, and minimize returns and cancellations.

Greater communication between brands and consumers

Wade Eagar, Head-Retail, Facebook UK opines the pandemic has accelerated mid- to long-term business plans of fashion brands. They are rushing to execute plans originally budgeted for a five-year period. Many brands have a management team comprising entrepreneurial millennials who have the ability to quickly innovate and adapt their offerings according to needs.

Eduard Pietrade, SonaeIM also agrees that future approach to retail needs to be based on the interaction between people, brands, technologies and customer interaction. To bring more trust and confidence into the market, brands will need not only be more transparent but also embrace their consumers’ shift to online channels.

An industry coalition representing a wide spectrum of domestic personal protective equipment (PPE) producers and the US textile industry outlined policy principles and objectives needed for reshoring and safeguarding domestic PPE manufacturing.

The coalition–including such organizations as the National Council of Textile Organizations, National Cotton Council and SEAMS–said the COVID-19 pandemic, which exposed severe shortages in the country’s PPE supply and “an over-reliance on foreign sourced products, underscores how important it is for the U.S. government to incentivize, support and maintain domestic manufacturing capacity for PPE.”

The coalition called on Congress and the Trump administration to adopt principles it outlined through legislation, executive order and other appropriate means. The principles will meet current needs and ensure a reliable domestic PPE manufacturing base capable of meeting our public health needs during a future crisis, the coalition said.

The principles include creating strong domestic procurement rules for federal PPE purchases so that taxpayer funds don’t go to China and other offshore PPE producers and “create the stable demand for U.S.-made PPE that will incentivize investment in domestic PPE manufacturing.

The group also called on the government to provide funding assistance for companies to reconstitute domestic PPE supply chains” to help companies repurpose their factories and purchase equipment to ramp up production, and supply grants or tax credits for companies that make such investments.

Jide Zeitlin, Chairman, Tapestry Inc, the parent company of the Kate Spade, Stuart Weitzman and Coach, has resigned from the company and board for personal reasons, effective immediately.

Zeitlin, who had been chairman since November 2014, took over as CEO in September 2019 after the New York-based company ousted its then-CEO Victor Luis.

Zeitlin was among only four Black CEOs of Fortune 500 companies. Joanne Crevoiserat, chief financial officer, has been appointed interim CEO of Tapestry while the company searches for a successor. The company said it will look at both internal and external candidates.

Todd Kahn, president and chief administrative officer and company secretary, will serve as interim chief executive officer and brand president of Coach. Andrea Shaw Resnick, global head of investor relations and corporate communications, has been named interim chief financial officer. In addition, Susan Kropf, the company’s lead independent director, has been appointed chair of the board.

Fiber giant Hyosung has expanded its 100 per cent recycled multi-function fiber offering, which it will present at Outdoor Retailer Online show from July 21-23, 2020.

In addition to Hyosung’s new GRS 100 per cent recycled creora regen spandex collection, the company will highlight the new recycled polyester and nylon yarns (among others) with added performance features during Outdoor Retailer Online.

It will highlight Hyosung’s 100 per cent recycled regen askin polyester with cooling technology offers cool touch, UV protection and rapid drying features created for those who like to play hard in the sun. With every tonne of 100 per cent reclaimed waste Hyosung uses to produce its GRS certified creora regen spandex, consumers will be happy to know it is saving approximately 2 tons of non-renewable raw material being extracted from the earth, the company says.

Hyosung’s Mipan regen robic is the first GRS certified recycled high-tenacity nylon made from 100% reclaimed waste developed for eco-conscious enthusiasts who rely on their gear wherever the adventure takes them.

Hyosung has increased its digital marketing initiatives to participate in virtual trade shows and events such as Outdoor Retailer Online and the recent Kingpins24 and Performance Days online shows. The company is also developing new Hyosung Performance Textiles social platforms to include a forthcoming blog along with LinkedIn, Instagram and YouTube pages, which will go live in August 2020.

Brands and buyers should be more responsible for ethical buying practices to make businesses sustainable, said speakers at recent a webinar in Bangladesh. They also advocated for mandatory government endorsement for future apparel contacts so that the textile suppliers and workers could resort to multilateral resolution if any brand declared itself bankrupt amid the virus fallout.

The webinar on COVID-19 fallout assessment on Bangladeshi ready-made sector was jointly organized by the France Bangladesh Chamber of Commerce and Industry (CCIFB) and the Policy Research Institute (PRI) of Bangladesh.

Dr Ahsan H Mansur, Executive Director, PRI was the keynote speaker, moderator and chair of the programme while Foreign Secretary Masud Bin Momen and Bangladesh Ambassador in France Kazi Imtiaz Hossain present were also present.

At the programme, Rubana Huq, President, BGMEA said that two French buyers Qamayu and Lahal had cancelled all orders in Bangladesh. However, other brands including Cellio were coming to negotiation gradually. Rubana said they were working with the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Bangladesh (ICAB) on ways of revising the contracts. She said the Bangladeshi exporters need to get back their position, but getting it back was not easy unless there was a fair purchasing practice in place. She said the buyers must understand a proper synchronization between sustainability and sourcing.

Mansur said the EU markets remain open for Bangladesh as they recover from COVID-19 while the USA market opens partly. But the demand of apparel may have shifted in both markets. He suggested diversifying products as the country mainly exports five items those contribute to about 73 percent of the total export. Dr Ahsan H Mansur also advised Bangladesh to develop a strong backward linkage industry to reduce the lead time – the time between the initiation and completion of a production process.

Esquel Group, one of the world’s largest shirt makers, has denied the US government’s allegations of using forced labor in its Changji Esquel Textile Co factory.

The Hong Kong-headquartered textile manufacturer established Changji Esquel Textile Co as a highly automated spinning mill in 2009 and has employed skilled technicians it says are paid at least 2-3 times the minimum wage level. The group reported that a global audit firm who last came to CJE in 2019 confirmed that it did not use forced labor, and over the years many international groups and customers have visited the site with positive reports.

Reports first linked Esquel Group to Xinjiang in 2019 and Esquel CEO John Cheh told The Wall Street Journal at the time that in 2017, officials started offering the company Uighurs from southern Xinjiang to employ. While Cheh said at the time that the company did take in 34 of them in the previous two years, its hiring decisions were made independently, and that Esquel Group was in no way forced to employ anyone.

He said the company’s recruitment process is the same for all candidates globally, and that’s what Esquel follows. Employees are free to leave the workplace at the close of the day or terminate their employment at will, he said, adding that there aren’t pay discrepancies based on race, ethnicity or gender either.

The Bangladesh government is going to establish three state-of-the-art technology centers and one design and technology centre to its raise productivity of masks and other PPE equipment.

For this purpose, Bangladesh Economic Zones Authority (Beza) and Bangladesh Hi-Tech Park Authority (BHTPA) have allotted two plots in favour of the EC4J Project to establish the technology centres.The setting up of job-oriented training centres will fulfill the skills gaps in different sectors, said Commerce Minister Tipu Munshi.

This initiative of the government will mainly supply technical knowhow and skilled manpower, which will enable local exporters into becoming more competitive globally, said Zunaid Ahmed Palak, state minister for ICT Division.

These technical centres will produce the skilled manpower and convey other technical knowledge in ICT business and hardware issues, he said. The technical centre inside Bangabandhu High Tech Park will also facilitate the creation of manpower for producing semiconductors and biotechnology and health technology products.

VF Corp plans to open Orefici 11, a 22,000-sq. ft. multibrand store on Milan’s central Via Orefici. The three-story space will house apparel and lifestyle products from three VF brands: The North Face, Timberland and Napapijri. The company’s other labels would periodically take over with dedicated corners.

In keeping with its commitment to environmental sustainability, the development of this store takes into account eco-friendly protocols, starting from the selected building, which is LEED Gold certified.

The group’s renovation of its Milan unit is aimed at preserving the storied building and celebrating the city’s architectural scene of the past century. Its new reception area will feature a small-scale architectural sculpture inspired by the facades of the city’s Sixties buildings characterized by green ceramic tiles, while elsewhere the signature walkways and balconies of Milan’s apartments will coexist with large steel beams nodding to the city’s industrial history.

The ground floor, named The Lab, will be dedicated to exclusive product collaborations and capsule collections developed by the featured brands, in addition to fitting rooms and relaxation areas. Inspired by the city’s architecture in the Eighties, it will be punctuated by a red tube running across the whole space paying homage to the local subway line.

Data released by the National Bureau of Statistics reveals that the profit of China’s industrial enterprises from January to May decreased by 19.3 percentage points on a year-on-year basis to total over CNY 1.84 trillion. The profit of its manufacturing industry also declined by 16.6 per cent to total over CNY 1.54 trillion.

From January to May, the main business income of Chinese textile enterprises above designated size decreased by 7.4 per cent to reach CNY 36.88 trillion compared with the same period the previous year; the profit of textile industry totaled CNY 30.96 billion, with year-on-year decline of 10.3 per cent. While the main business income of enterprises above designated size in garment and accessories industry declined by 16.9 per cent year-on-year to reach CNY 464.7 billion. The profit of garment and accessories industry declined by 29.2 per cent year-on-year to reach CNY 18.05 billion,

From January to May, China’s main income from its leather, fur, feather and their products and footwear industry declined by 18.1 per cent year-on-year to reach CNY 362.85 billion, while their profit totaled CNY 16.74 billion, with year-on-year decline of 30.3 per cent.

From January to May, the main business income of enterprises above designated size in chemical fiber manufacturing industry declined by 18.0 per cent year-on-year to CNY 286.29 billion, while its profit declined by 59.1 per cent to total CNY 4.1 billion, In May, the profit of industrial enterprises above designated size improved by 6.0 per cent to total CNY 582.34 billion

Dora L International (DLI), a global intimate wear company has developed a range of cooling bras with hi-tech features. These bras are made up of a silky microfiber material with breathable mesh details and an open back to help keep things cool. DLI spends a significant amount of time and research on materials and testing the newest fibers that translate trends into viable products that women will love. The company has a large network of resources that allow it to create a ‘best in class’ solution that women of every shape and size will love.

These cooling brands are carefully designed using cutting-edge technologies to resist moisture, keep your body cooler for longer, and are made of fabrics that are specifically engineered to offer support and comfort. The DLI team used research from thermal imaging which shows the difference between body heat when wearing a “normal bra” versus one using cooling fabrics.

Wear testing was also used to ensure both technology and design work together with the intended style and purpose. Cooling bras developed by DLI have both cooling fabric and breathable pads to enable air flow in addition to the cool to touch fabric which wicks moisture away from the body. Another technology, 3D design, allows for illustrating and sharing with clients.