Loyalty Lift Retail Sales

Apparel business has grown to become highly competitive, and retailers have to mull strategies. Having a competitive edge in the business world is vital. Rather than relaying on other tricks of trade, retailers prefer to establish a one-to-one relationship with their customers to improve their sales performance. With an intention to enhance their customer base significantly, retailers seek for Loyalty Programs to gain direct access to their customers. It enables them to identify, communicate, and market to the end users, and also maintain the distributor relationships at the same time.

As per a recent market survey, considering their buying attitudes, apparel shoppers can be classified into three main categories. Fashion forward customers, looking for latest style clothing, conservative customers who prefer a traditional look in their garments, and value driven consumers who give more preference to value and comfort comparatively over style. Fashion forward customers comprise of 16% of the population, while conservative customers make 34%, and the remaining 50% is of value driven customers. Of this, conservative consumers are more motivated by the loyalty programs, and store credit cards.

A survey states that 76% of the retailers, and 75% of the shoppers are engaged in one loyalty program. One third of the customers are involved in multiple loyalty programs. Shoppers stop claims that almost 60% of its sales are from loyalty members. Many kinds of loyalty programs are followed. As customers bought apparels, they earned points that can be redeemed as merchandise rewards, or travel. Points can also be accumulated to acquire a more valuable reward later on. Special promotions are also offered during days important to the consumer such as anniversary, birthday etc. A top-up discount based on the frequency of visits can also be offered.

Brands also need to foster the loyalty of their customers so as to retain them, especially during tough times. Notable brands such as Westside, Adidas, Levis, and Spencers Retail have managed to keep their customer base intact through their loyalty programs, delivering immediate value, preference and personal significance. Product launches planned intermittently, and innovative loyalty programs facilitated them to ride the tide during recession.

Loyalty programs help to create an emotional bonding, thereby resulting in a life long customer relationship. They have gained immense popularity in the past decade. This is mainly due to the culture of entitlement, wherein the customers believe that they deserve a special treatment over the normal visitors due to their frequency in visiting the retailer. Retailers have learnt to smartly capitalize this attitude of the customers through their creative thoughts. It might cost them a little, but brings forth goodwill, and ultimately resulting in the long term relationship with them. They are now a key to revenue growth of any business. Thus, it can be precisely called as a Loyalty craze.

GENIUS

Eco-friendly home fashion brand Portico Home & Spa is introducing its GENIUS collection of luxuriously soft and breathable sheets made with a unique 60/40 percent blend of organic cotton and TENCEL MICRO during the HFPA New York Home Fashions Market September 13-17 at its showroom at 230 Fifth Avenue, Suite 1910, in New York City.

Portico is one of the only companies to have introduced such products to the North American market.

This collection is available in fig, stone, earth, and cloud colors and is perfect for homes or hotels interested in being stylish as well as environmentally conscious. TENCEL, a fine cellulose-based fiber made in a closed loop processing system, is known for being soft, wrinkle resistant, absorbent, and durable.Buyers will also be visiting a separate Portico showroom at the United Feather & Down offices at 1071 Avenue of the Americas featuring Portico’s Essential Bedding collection of comforters, pillows, blankets, and mattress pads made with 100 percent organic cotton.

Portico Home & Spa launched its first bed (blankets, coverlets, decorative pillows, duvets, shams, and sheets), and bath ( bath robes, rugs, towels) collection of items made with organic cotton at the Fall 2009 HFPA show.

This resulted in highly successful sales in both the United States and Canada. Portico anticipates sales in over 500 doors, more than double the current number, in major retailers in both countries by the end of 2010.

Noted author and green living expert Summer Rayne Oakes consults on the lines and serves as the Portico brand ambassador.

Textile Recycling

These days the 'rag and bone' men are textile reclamation businesses, which collect textiles for reuse (often abroad), and send material to the 'wiping' and 'flocking' industry and fibres to be reclaimed to make new garments. Textiles made from both natural and man-made fibres can be recycled.

It is estimated that more than 1 million tons of textiles are thrown away every year, with most of this coming from household sources. Textiles make up about 3% by weight of a household bin. At least 50% of the textiles we throw away are recyclable, however, the proportion of textile wastes reused or recycled annually in the US is only around 20%.

Although the majority of textile waste originates from household sources, waste textiles also arise during yarn and fabric manufacture, garment-making processes and from the retail industry. These are termed post-industrial waste, as opposed to the post-consumer waste which goes to jumble sales and charity shops. Together they provide a vast potential for recovery and recycling.

Recovery and recycling provide both environmental and economic benefits. Textile recovery:
Reduces the need for landfill space. Textiles present particular problems in landfill as synthetic (man-made fibers) products will not decompose, while woolen garments do decompose and produce methane, which contributes to global warming.

Reduces pressure on virgin resources.
Aids the balance of payments as we import fewer materials for our needs.
Results in less pollution and energy savings, as fibers do not have to be transported from abroad.
Reclaiming fiber avoids many of the polluting and energy intensive processes needed to make textiles from virgin materials, including: -
Savings on energy consumption when processing, as items do not need to be re-dyed or scoured.
Less effluent, as unlike raw wool, it does not have to be thoroughly washed using large volumes of water.
Reduction of demand for dyes and fixing agents and the problems caused by their use and manufacture.

How, what and where of recycling textiles:
The majority of post-consumer textiles are currently collected by charities like The Salvation Army, Good Will and Chalk. Some charities, for example Good Will and The Salvation Army, sort collected material selling it on to merchants in the appropriate sectors.
Some postindustrial waste is recycled 'in-house', usually in the yarn and fabric manufacturing sector. The rest, aside from going to landfill or incineration, is sent to merchants.
Collection Method's:
At present the consumer has the option of putting textiles in 'clothes banks', taking them to charity shops or having them picked up for a donation drive.

The Salvation Army is the largest operator of textile banks in the US. On average, each of these banks is estimated to collect about six tons of textiles per year. Combined with door-to-door collections, The Salvation Army's textile recycling operations account for the processing of in excess of 17,000 tons of clothing a year. Clothes are given to the homeless, sold in charity shops or sold in developing countries in Africa, the Indian sub-continent and parts of Eastern Europe. Nearly 70% of items put into clothing banks are reused as clothes, and any un-wearable items are sold to merchants to be recycled and used as factory wiping cloths.

Take your used clothes to a textile bank. Contact the recycling officer in your local authority if there are no banks in your area and ask why; they may collect textiles through other means. Alternatively you can take used clothing to local charity shops.

Give old clothes/shoes/curtains/handbags etc. to jumble sales. Remember to tie shoes together: part of the 6% of textiles which is wastage for merchants are single shoes.

Buy second-hand clothes - you can often pick up unusual period pieces! If bought from a charity shop, it will also benefit a charity.

Buy things you are likely to wear a long time - a dedicated follower of fashion can also be a green one if items are chosen carefully.

Look for recycled content in the garments you buy. This should be on the label, though at present there is no conventional marking scheme and some companies do not always advertise the recycled content.

Buy cloth wipers instead of disposable paper products as the product can be used repeatedly.

INDIAN INDEPENDENCE DAY

For a long time our Motherland India was under a foreign Government. She got back her freedom on the 15th August 1947. Since then every year we have been observing the 15th August as our Independence Day.

We should observe the independence Day to remember our great national struggle and our great victory. It is a holy and auspicious day for us. Besides, this day reminds us our duty and responsibility for our country. On this day, we review what we have done during the year past. We think what we should do during the year beginning. On this day, we take the solemn pledge to serve our mother country. Our Independence Day is great occasion for us.

This day is observed with much pomp and grandeur in the cities and towns. It is quite fittingly celebrate in our national capital. New Delhi and in all the State capitals. On this day, we see the police parade and the march past. People rally round the National Flags of India. Flag-hoisting forms an important part of this ceremony. The National Anthem "Jana Gana Mana..." is sung everywhere. Our President, Prime Minister, Ministers, Governors and State ministers publish their messages to the Nation. All the educational institutions and organizations observe this day with morning-procession and flag-hoisting. Sweets are distributed among the children. Every house and every office building is highly decorated on this day. In the evening, meetings are held all over the country to commemorate our great national leaders and workers who sacrificed their lives for freedom of India.

It is scared duty of every Indian young and old to observe the independence day of India. It is the day on which we should sincerely promise to be dutiful to our Motherland. Our Independence day is a great occasion for us.

Cotton rebound

He needs a jumbo card to list hats he wears out of North Valley Gin on the outskirts of Sutter, Calif.

Amarel keeps busy in the northern reaches of the

Cotton Belt:
• Managing the Valley’s lone cotton gin
• Farming 600 acres
• Overseeing the custom harvest of another 1,000 acres
• Helping many of the 20 Northern California cotton growers market their crops
• Negotiating planting seed contracts.

Doug Munier, University of California Cooperative Extension farm advisor in Glen County, said Amarel also spends a lot of time teaching new growers the finer points of growing cotton.
“Mel does a good job for his growers. He understands cotton,” said Munier, who was a farm advisor in Kern County before moving north 15 years ago, taking with him years of cotton experience from the southern San Joaquin Valley.

There were just 1,000 acres harvested in 1995 when cotton returned to the Valley after a commercial absence of more than 70 years. It peaked at more than 22,000 in 2001. Many thought it had the potential to reach 100,000 acres or more in the northern Valley.

However, like the rest of the U.S. Cotton Belt, the fiber crop fell on hard times. Acreage began to decline, a casualty of low prices and competition from more profitable crops. It fell to its lowest level in the Sacramento Valley last year, when only 2,250 acres were planted.

And like the rest of the U.S., cotton has rebounded there this season, more than doubling last year’s acreage.

North Valley Gin is locally owned by Amarel and his partners. A larger gin once operated in the Valley.

When the acreage decline started, a trio of managers representing the larger gin took Amarel to lunch and offered to buy him out. He offered to buy them out. They responded they would run Amarel and North Valley out of business.

“I told them they wouldn’t drive me out of business. They said, ‘why?’ and I said because there are three of you doing what I do alone, and besides you are buying lunch,” he laughs.

The other gin closed three years ago.
There are almost 5,000 acres in Glenn, Colusa and Sutter counties this year. Amarel expects to gin 14,000 to 15,000 bales this fall. Yields may be off from last year’s 3.3 gin average, but he is confident his 20 growers can bring in a good crop. Many are seasoned cotton producers, dating back more than 15 years as north country cotton growers. Four are new cotton producers this year.

Modern day cotton in the Valley actually dates to 1976. That is when the late Buel Mouser, then the Chico State University farm manager and later school ag professor, started growing cotton on the school farm. When he retired, he wrote a research paper detailing what he had learned about growing cotton in the Sacramento Valley. His report sparked grower interest in cotton as an alternative crop. The first farmer crop was grown in the mid 1990s.

It was a rough start, primarily because of 2,4D drift issues from

rice to cotton. Cotton is very susceptible to 2,4D aerial drift and rice growers resented the introduction of the crop. A second concern was the feared spread of verticillium wilt from cotton to olives. Cotton is still banned from certain areas of the Valley because of that issue, even though olives and cotton have long co-existed side-by-side in the San Joaquin Valley, and research has shown cotton poses no threat to NorCal olives.

Survival of cotton in the Sacramento Valley is a surprise to many with such small acreage and one gin. “I am not really surprised cotton’s still here. It may be a little more difficult to grow than some other crops. The season is longer than other North Valley crops.

“However, the revenue has been there year after year. There have been ups and downs, but cotton has been fairly consistent through it all,” he says.

SJV Acalas and even Pimas have been tried in the north, but it has been uplands that have been consistent. “No one wants to pick cotton at Christmas time,” he laughs.

The 2010 rebound has come with 80-cent cotton and lucrative seed contracts Amarel has negotiated for his growers the past few years.

Spinning industry demands lift of duty, quota on yarn

Spinning industry owners met the government last week to ensure that, quota and duty imposed on yarn exports is lifted by July 26.

But the value-added textile sector wants the government to continue with the duty imposition on yarn, for another year.Crisis surrounding yarn has not yet been solved, despite several policy measures taken up by the Textile Ministry, to ensure yarn is available at reduced rates.Now, while the value-added textile segment complains about dearth in yarn clubbed with increased yarn prices, spinning industry owners are blaming the government of fraudulently playing with the open market economy and denying the spinners opportunities for export, via imposition of restrictions and duties on exports of yarn.

During a meeting of the value-added segment with the Prime Minister, Yousuf Raza Gilani and Textile Minister, Rana Farooq, they demanded that, the government continues with the imposition of duty on yarn. In addition, they have also demanded for a three years freeze on about Rs 300 billion debt of the value-added segment and a bailout package, just like the defunct industries received during the late 90s.

But, the certain associations did meet the Finance Minister to get an assurance that, the temporary restrictions and duties on exports of yarn, which expire on July 26, are not given an extension. But they did not receive any, as he refrained from giving any promises.Deliveries made in the month of June are at a much lower rate than the rates at which yarn is currently being supplied to the local industry. This is because, exports of yarn carried out in the last week of June, were made due to the Letters of Credits (LCs), which were opened prior to May 13, as shipments post it were held back for over a month by the government.

The current export price of yarn in the international market stands at Rs 127 a pound as compared to Rs 115 a pound, which was practiced in the domestic market.As per a spinner and knitwear exporter, the apparel segment was under tremendous stress over the last nine months, owing to contracts, which were inked at reduced prices. But the new deals are being inked at 20 percent higher prices.

Moreover, with the current rate of cotton at Rs 6,700 a maund, the cost of producing yarn has also surged to Rs 120 a pound.As of now, spinning industry owners are supplying yarn to the domestic industry at a rate of Rs 110-115 per pound, which has lead them to register a daily loss of Rs 300,000 – 500,000, in anticipation that things might change.

TEXTILE TALK BLOG

TEXTILE TALK BLOG

From fan pages to photo sharing, from podcasting to micro-blogging, anyone and everyone knows that social media is the way to overcome new challenges and remain in the know when it comes to your industry. One big challenge within the Apparel and Textile Industry in particular is the ability to find and network with new resources, suppliers, and innovators that can meet the needs of smaller to mid-size companies. The Fabric Stock Exchange's Textile Talk is the first and only comprehensive on-line community for people and businesses to network together, share information, and keep on top of trends.

Textile Talk offers a central location for industry professionals to read about the latest news and textile developments. The blog covers trends, design, technology and more. Additionally, the resource area of the blog offers a comprehensive dictionary of fibers, fabric types, and color names. Easy to use, Textile Talk is a great way to stay connected and up-to-date. There are also links to industry related products - all available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Alice Wu, co-founder, designer and partner of the womenswear line Feral Childe is already very excited about Textile Talk. "What a great resource! I like the personal style of writing and have already made use of and found the resource and links pages to be very valuable. I look forward to more articles and will definitely be a frequent visitor to the site." She adds " The Textile Talk blog offers me a perspective from people who know and love textiles (and the business of it all!). There are consumer fashion websites, and there are websites for designers such as PatternPeople that focus on prints, or purely business but I think Textile Talk offers a unique B2B angle that is again, personal yet industry oriented."

Apparel, automotive, hospitality, outdoor and eco and sustainable fabrics are all included in the topics to be discussed. More than just the voice of the Fabric Stock Exchange, this blog allows readers to become guest editors and share their own insight and opinions by submitting their posts themselves; whether it's a written article or simply an image or video.

According to owner and industry expert, Sheryl Sapriel, "The Fabric Stock Exchange's Textile Talk is a visually exciting and interesting blog about fabric that is informative, educational and fun." Blog Updates will also be posted on the company's Facebook, Twitter and Linked-In pages.

About The Fabric Stock Exchange

The Fabric Stock Exchange is a fabric brokering service for small manufacturers, fashion designers, retail fabric stores, fabric converters, importers and fabric jobbers. The company specializes in selling first quality, off-price, immediately available fabrics at BELOW WHOLESALE prices. The Fabric Stock Exchange has been successfully bringing buyers and sellers together for over 30 years.

The Fabric Stock Exchange sells all types of fabrics - natural, natural blends and synthetics in both knits and wovens. Most of the fabrics sold are from the excess inventories of Seventh Avenue Designers, Broadway manufacturers, overseas apparel factories, fabric mills, converters, and importers. The Fabric Stock Exchange represents companies worldwide. All of the fabrics offered are from top mills here and abroad.