By Jasmin Malik Chua | November 20, 2024
Despite all chatter to the contrary, fashion companies are still dragging their feet when it comes to diversifying their supplier base, Sheng Lu, professor of fashion and apparel studies at the University of Delaware, said at the United States Fashion Industry Association’s Apparel Importers Trade & Transportation Conference in New York City last week.
The proof is in the numbers, he said. In a tally of the top 10 suppliers of clothing products to the United States from January to October, China accounted for almost 61 percent of imports with nearly 62,000 SKUs. Its next-closest rivals—India and Vietnam—barely registered as challengers with only 15,000 SKUs apiece. Cambodia was a distant fourth with 3,500 SKUs and Bangladesh an even further fifth with less than 3,000.
he problem is that finding a sourcing locale that can offer the same breadth of products as China remains a lift so heavy that it’s proven nearly impossible to budge, Lu said. Buying from China isn’t so much about price anymore but capabilities. While the types of apparel made by what he dubbed the “Asia 5”—meaning Bangladesh, Cambodia, India, Indonesia and Vietnam—have ticked up over the past year, there are still holes in what they can offer. The Asia 5 can only fulfill 71 percent of the tops and 47 percent of the dresses that China supplies, for instance.