Case Study

Fabric consumption means the length or weight of fabrics needed for making a single piece of
garment (apparel product). You know that for making apparel items, either you use knitted fabrics
or woven fabrics. Fabric consumptions are measured in two different units (UOM) for knits and
for woven fabric. Fabric consumption of knits garment is calculated in Kgs and the consumption
of woven garment is calculated in meters or in yards.
Like other business, garment factory is set for profit generation. Profit can be improved by saving
from each cost factors of garment making. The fabric is most important constitute of a garment
and it represents around 60-70% of total product manufacturing cost. Fabric cost of a product
depends on how much fabric is consumed to make the garment including cut wastes and end bits.
So fabric consumption must be calculated accurately.
Most of the Indian apparel factories fabric consumption is made by pattern masters. Rest of the
employees do not bother how it is done. If you have a product technical sheet then you can
calculate the exact fabric consumption of a garment. Average fabric consumption also depends on
nature of the fabric, like tubular or open width fabric. Whether the fabric is solid colored, check or
stripe or any specific design repeat required. In the following, one example has been shown with
a formula for better clarification about the calculation.
In the operation bulletin, IE also plans the actual machine requirement for each operation. See the
following image. Where possible, operations are clubbed (where similar machine type is required)
for balancing available time per machine and SAM of operations. But for all operations balancing
is not possible. That is why in the OB, IE gets variation in between two figures - calculated
machines and actual machine numbers. Total variation of the machine numbers for a style is known
as balancing loss.
An example: For label attaching operation computerized single needle lock stitch machine is used.
Compared to other operations, SAM of this operations is low. As a result target production is
achieved in less than given hours. So for this machine/operator doesn't have work for full day. This
machine would not be used for other operation too. So the line will lose his/her productive time.
For a particular operation (label attaching) balancing loss can be improved by increasing
production target. But to meet the increased target in one operation, one may loss balancing in
other operations.
See in the following sample operation bulletin of a Polo Shirt. Calculated machine number and
allocated machine numbers are respectively 26.42 and 29. Variation of machine numbers is 2.58
machines.