Has your quality control department ever brought to your attention that certain measurements in one of your shipments isn’t matching up with the original factory specifications? Is it that far off that you have to hold back the shipment and not send it off to the stores? Here are a few problems that Darn It! Helped solve in the first half of this year.
ARE YOUR LEGS TOO SHORT?
A major women’s retailer received a shipment of pants in January, and through their Garment Inspection Audit they found a major issue with the inseam measurement?
What to do now? There are size 6 pants that are as long as a size 10. There are also size 10 units that could be considered Capri Pants!!! What happened here? Something went wrong in the factory and our customer needed us to help them get these 16,000 pair of Lady’s wool pants to the shelves and online ASAP. Once samples were received, we realized that this purchase order needed a full inspection of each inseam to see whether or not the inseam specifications were correct. Approximately 60% of the shipment was ok. These units were packed up immediately and back in the stores within days. The balance of the pants fell into two categories.
- If the inseam was too long, we cut the pant legs to shorten them and get them back to their proper specifications. This process of hemming the pant was completed so that the consumer would never know that the pant was ever altered. All of the pants were pressed and re-packaged in their original form.
- If the inseam was too short, then the pant was then put aside as a damaged unit. The customer wasn’t interested in a lady’s WOOL SHORT!!
Fortunately, Darn It! Was able to save about 88% of this shipment and get it back to the customer’s distribution center within 5 days.
IS YOUR HEAD TOO BIG???
What if you received a large shipment (42,000 pcs.) of sweaters and someone on your garment inspection team couldn’t get their head through the neck opening of the sweater when attempting to try it on? When measuring the opening, they found a major problem. The opening was too small on many of the audited pieces. What to do now? Unfortunately, the other specifications of all of the sweaters were correct and the only measurement that was in question was the neck opening.
Luckily, the yarn in the neck opening stretched slightly, so Darn It! came up with a plan. We fabricated a plastic board that simulated someone’s head going through the neck opening on the sweater. We were able to save time and the customer some money by having these templates to perform the relatively quick inspection. If the template for that size sweater was able to get through the neck opening without breaking any of the stitching, then that was considered a first quality unit. If any of the stitches broke or the template couldn’t be pushed through, then unfortunately, this sweater was no good and we had to sort it as a damage.
With the template process, we were able to perform the entire garment inspection and sort in just 6 days. Fortunately, our customer was able to salvage about half of the units. The balance had to be remade overseas and flown in overnight to fill the balance of the orders.
The moral to the story is that if you have these types of issues, don’t waste another minute trying to figure out, “What’s next?!!” Contact the garment inspection team at Darn It! We will partner with you to sort through these issues quickly.
Your Problem Is Our Business!
Darn It! Inc.
