ON-DEMAND MANUFACTURING THE FUTURE OF THE APPAREL INDUSTRY

Tech automation and data analytics are the key components that empower brands to respond to consumer demand in an ‘on-demand’ production cycle that cuts down waste, helps avoid overstocking and reduces the use of resources……

- Dipti Tolani

The apparel industry has been infamous for overproduction, overstocking, poor working conditions for its workers and causing pollution on a large scale. The root cause of this is that production still uses the age-old inventory model. In the new age of tech and on-demand, the apparel industry still, for the most part, uses the traditional manufacturing and supply chain model.

Let’s understand this in a deeper way. Design and production are typically long and cumbersome processes, sometimes requiring nearly a year to plan and move products to market. Most brands and large businesses employ factories in developing countries to produce their goods. These factories take several months to deliver the garments and require a minimum order quantity to produce, which is usually tens of thousands of units per style. This leads to massive over production, excesses in inventory stock and tons of unsold inventory eventually. One of the biggest fast fashion brands had $ 4 billion of unsold inventory last year alone. And what happened to this unsold inventory? It was dumped in landfills in developing countries, causing further pollution and destruction to the environment.