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Scanner cuts cost of custom-made clothes

AP

A five-by-nine foot box that resembles a small recording studio may symbolise the future of the troubled American textile industry. The machine - a digital scanner that can register more than 200,000 data points on the body - generates patterns for custom-made clothing that is faster and cheaper to make than any that could be turned out by a Hong Kong tailor.

Developed by [TC], a Cary firm funded by the textile apparel industry and taxpayers, the machine offers hope for an industry that has been devastated by free trade and lower overseas labour costs. The idea behind the body scanner is to condition consumers to expect custom-fitted clothing delivered fast and cheaply - something that could make American-based apparel manufacturers more competitive with overseas manufacturers who are less equipped to respond quickly to American fashion trends.

“We’re really providing value to the industry by showing them how to cut down that product development time,” said Mr Jim Lovejoy, director of industry programs at [TC]. “We asked our board, I think it was about three years ago now, ‘What can we do to help your business? What would be the key thing?’ “They said, ‘Help us get products to the market quicker.’

“Just making clothes isn’t enough anymore,” said Mr Charles Estes, director of the traditional industries programme at Georgia Tech. “The companies are going to have to get the right product with the customer specifications to them in a timely manner,” Mr Estes said. “I think the supply chain concepts are beginning to be more important to the textile industries than they have been in the past.” The flagship store of the Brooks Brothers men’s clothing chain on New York ’s Madison Avenue has had an older, larger version of the [TC] scanner for 2 1/2 years now. According to Mr Rich Honiball, head of special orders for the company, “Thousands of units have been sold, including suits and dress shirts. When it first came out there was a high amount of publicity for the digital tailoring.” He said, “We saw a two-to-three month tremendous spike. Now, we’re building it from season to season through word of mouth. But overall I’d say we’re pleased.”

Mr Honiball said digital suit measurements from the scanner in New York are sent electronically to a plant in Lawrence, Mass., which makes the suits and ships them back to the store, usually within 15 business days. He said the store is examining ways to further speed the process. Shirts made with measurements taken by the scanner are made at a factory and usually arrive back at the store within 10 business days, Mr Honiball informed.

In [TC]’s current, fourth-generation body scanner, four strategically placed cameras register data points. That information is fed into measurement software that spits out 200 accurate body measurements in less than a minute. The measurements can be applied directly to a clothing pattern on a computer screen, showing consumers how the clothes will fit. While Brooks Brothers considers ordering more of the scanners, a Searcy, Ark.-based company called BenchMark Clothiers already has bought one and has 11 more on order. BenchMark plans to lease the scanners to high-end men’s clothing stores in the Carolinas and the rest of the East Coast. Mr Neil Allen, BenchMark’s regional sales representative for the Southeast, said the idea is to provide consumers with a custom-made suit at the same price as an off-the-rack suit in the US$ 400 to US$ 750 range. Current scanner models are smaller than ever, to take up as little room as possible on a retail floor. “It’s just basically taking a lot of the guesswork out of tailoring,” Mr Allen stated. “If you go to a tailor, they have to get used to how you wear your clothes. This gets it right all of the time.”

[TC] was founded in 1981 by companies from the textile and apparel industry with the intent of pushing research and development in the fields. The company is funded in part by an annual, renewable, US$ 2.7 million grant from the US commerce department. The push to marry apparel and the digital age is coming from retailers like Brooks Brothers, Levi Strauss and J.C. Penney, who all belong to the organisation. “We’re looking at more information systems, technologies and things like that rather than trying to save the jobs here,” Mr Lovejoy said. “What we think is going to stay here, obviously the marketing and the advertising and there is good reason to think the product development will at least start here.”