$$$ Costs You Must Consider $$$

Once you get an idea of the design, it is highly recommended to get a reference sample if you are letting us (or someone else other than yourself) do the pattern so pattern maker can have better understanding on the shape and the fit you are aiming for. Not a must, but is highly recommended especially if you are aiming for a special design.

Fabric is normally charged per yard and they might require minimum order quantity. But ask if you can get sample yardage to begin with, some might give you a few yard for free of charge, some might charge you per yard. It is recommended to get enough material to make at least 5 proto samples in the beginning. 

Pattern costs vary depending on complexity of design. Sometimes the pattern work is hard even the product looks very simple on the outside. Make sure to discuss with pattern maker about cost and complexity, and if there’s a way to make it easier to work with.

Proto Sample also costs vary depending on complexity of design.  Sample is charged each piece when is made, so if you are making revision on pattern and if it requires to make a sample with revised pattern it will cost you another sample price. If just little change is needed and it’s possible to make changes on sample you already got, then it will cost less than making another sample. You will need to supply us all materials for your design. Make sure to discuss about cost and complexity and if there’s a way to make it easier.

After seeing fit from your proto sample and if you want to make change on it, there will be a cost for us to make changes on pattern. Cost may vary depending on what kind and how many changes you want to make, so it is important to have a clear idea of a fit you are aiming and discuss with pattern maker to find better ways.

You will need to have your own brand label and tag unless you do not want these on your products. Care& size label may be provided by sewing contracter if you are good with paper care label but if you don’t want paper label then you will have to purchase your own and provide it to sewing contractor. Cost per piece may might not seem a lot, but they normally require minimum order quantity.

When you are all good with pattern & proto sample so it’s good to go, next will be deciding what sizes you want to have this garment in & quantity ratio for production. Costs vary depending on how many sizes and how long the marker will be but not much difference in the cost of range.

Once you got your marker, you will take this & your fabric to your cutter. Cutting charges may vary complexity & how many pieces you will be cutting. This normally charged per piece, but make it clear if they have any minimum.

When cuts are done, you will head to your sewing contractor with all your supply. Costs vary by quantity,and are charged by each piece. More quantity, less cost per piece; Less quantity, more cost per piece. Make it clear if they require any minimum quantity to work with.

Steps of Process You Must Know & Will Be Taking

Very first thing you will need to start for production is, of course, having an idea & design of the item you will produce. This can be a drawing, a modified photo, a sample that you want to modify from, etc. Regardless of what material you are starting with to express your idea, it is always best to have a physical reference sample for pattern maker which will help you save a lot of money & time.

You will want to find a right sewing contractor for your design, even before you start making pattern & samples. Of course you can look for them later once you get your own proto sample done, but it is better to find out if it is possible to do it in the States, what minimum quantity you need to make, what are run time and etc as these information may affect your plan. Bring your design, get reference samples and talk to contractors about costs, quantity and time. Some contractors won’t be giving you the cost unless they see your final proto sample but at least getting idea of capability is very important.

After your idea is done, you will need to look for fabric and trims for your design. Without choosing the fabric you are going to work with, it would be hard to get the correct pattern in time because you won’t know what thickness, weight, stretchiness and shrinkage you will be dealing with. We recommend getting enough material at least to make 3~4 proto samples, especially when you really want to build up your own brand sizing. You would also want to get your own brand label & sizing label as well. This might not be a priority as labeling can be very last step, but it takes time to order and get your label in hand so it is recommended have labels ready before you start cutting & sewing massive quantity.

Pattern is like blueprint for your product. These are pieces of papers that tell sewers how they should cut & sew the fabric. So having correct pattern is the most important part among all production process, because it can’t be undone once you start cutting massive quantity of fabric. It’s depending on how detail you are aiming for your design but normally designers take 3~4 fixes on pattern to get the fit they are looking for. And because it costs money each time you revise the pattern, which having reference sample helps a lot to save on these expenses, you would really want to have clear idea for your final product.

It is VERY IMPORTANT to talk in numbers (measurements) to describe your design, because we all have different perspective when we see a same thing. “Make it little short”, “I want the waist to be narrow and wide on hip” does not specify how narrow, how short, how wide you are looking for. We talk in numbers –  “Make the waist 30” around, total length 65” from top point of shoulder”. And as we have mentioned above, this measurements are being applied on pattern, not proto sample. Keep in mind that when you talk about changes and fit, it’s always being applied to pattern and proto sample is made based on that pattern.

Meaning when you say “65 inches total length”, the pattern will be made with 65” length but proto sample won’t be 65”. Then how long is actual sample is going to be?  No one knows unless the actual proto sample is made and being tried on. 

Why is that?

Because there are many different factors that gives change on proto sample while it’s being made, while pattern is always going to be on fixed intangible paper piece. And most of the time, it’s the fabric that makes huge difference. Every fabric has different characteristic and specs, even if fabric contents percentage is exactly same. Fabric might shrink, fabric might stretch too much, fabric might not stretch badly etc. And we don’t know how this will make change on actual sample unless the sample comes out and being tried on a person. When you want to be really specific and you are looking to build your own brand sizing, we recommend looking up “spec sheet” on Google and see how fashion companies are being specific on measurements.

As I have mentioned above, you will need to make a proto sample when the pattern is out. Proto sample is very much necessary to see if you want to make more changes on pattern as well as to see if the fabric & material you chose worked well as your first idea. While proto sample is being made, you will be finding errors of materials and plans if there are any.

Fitting is the process to see how the sample actually fit on a person, so you can see how you want to revise the pattern. We do know many clients wanted to skip this step but this is super duper important that should not be missed, if you want your customers to comeback and make purchase again.

Some company hires professional model to do fitting, but that is not necessary. We see that fitting on person with the size of your targeted market results the best.

After fitting is done, if you want to make changes you will repeat step 3~7 until you decide it's good to go. (and yes, it costs each time)

There will be cost charged on revising pattern, and if you are making a huge change it might cost you a whole new pattern (which is a rare case).

Proto sample is charged as each sample, but the change you are making is small and can be done on the sample you already have, you are not gonna be charged for a whole new sample but small charge of revising.

If you like the fit and it seems good to go, you will decide how many and what sizes you are willing to produce with this design. You can use the final proto sample to show your buyers to take pre-orders, or use it to take catalog photo. 

So the pattern and sample you’ve done is just one of sizes of your whole production. Let’s say you’ve decided to make this sample size a “Medium” and you want this design to be produced in 3 different sizes: Small, Medium, Large – you need the grading. And yes, this also costs you as it was mentioned from above "cost list". As pattern is going to be a medium we’ll be using this pattern as a base, and grade Small and Large from it. To grade sizes you will need “Grading Rules”.

What is Grading Rules? 

It’s rule that how many inches you want to increase or reduce on each part. For example, let’s say you are making a mini dress, and you want to have 2” difference on waist for each sizes. But as length of legs, width or arms might not make dramatic difference on people, you might want to have ½” difference on armhole, and ¼” difference on total length.

As you can see from this example, you will want to set a rule how many inch differences there will be for each part to make it work for all sizes of your production.

If you are not thinking about going too detail on it and not aiming to have special sizing, you can ask us to apply regular grading rule that is normally applied on most garment. If you are building up your own brand sizing, you would want to give us all detail on each part to grade. 

Marking normally goes together with "Grading" step so you would give grading & marking information at the same time to do the work. So now you are all done with proto, you will plan to cut rolls of fabric to start your mass production. Marker is a big and long piece of paper that has guidelines to cut stacks of fabric for cutter. Marker normally follows up with grading, and you will need to consider what ratio you want your sizes to be cut into.

For Example for S,M,L – your ratio can be 2:2:2 or 2:2:1 (or however you want)

If you are looking to cut into specific quantity for each size so that can’t be calculated as a ratio, it’s going to be single markers – meaning each size will have its own marker (which of course costs more!)

When your marker is ready, make sure to check mini marker carefully to catch any error. Because it cannot be undone once stacks of fabric is cut.

Once you get your marker, you will take this to your cutter. Marker is normally a big roll of paper, but you can also get a digital file (plt extension file) if your cutter works digitally. If you are not close from us and willing to work via mailing, we can ship paper marker by folding it, OR we can send the file so your cutter can print it out if that's possible with your cutter.

Once your cuts are all done from cutter, you will bring these cuts to your sewing contractor. You will have to hand the pattern & pattern chart, and also the proto sample to them for the most of the case so they can see all instructions. You will also have to provide that brand label, care label, and brand tags and give them instruction the placement of labels and tags. You will also be deciding if your completed garments to be folded and packed in which package or you want it to be on hangers. So when you hand them a sample it’s nice if you have everything labeled, tagged and packed as a final product so they know exactly how they are going to finish garments.