Report

Introduction:
Sepal Group is a reputed private group established on 1985. Covering a compound area of 300,000
square feet at Gazipur, Sepal Group upholds a 10-storied state of the art building with
approximately 25,000 square feet production area per floor with 28 lines; hosting an advanced in-
house set-up to support an annual production capacity of 10 million pieces with optimum clients’
satisfaction. Sepal Group, one of the leading Garment Manufacturers in Bangladesh, started its
journey towards leadership in excellent quality and service at every job level. Being a 100% export
oriented industry as approved by the country’s Board of Investment (BOI) and a permanent
member of Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers & Exporters Association (BGMEA), Sepal has
achieved a consistent growth in business over almost 30 years, and is now a proud owner of the
country’s most compliant establishment with the best available standards maintained by its
unsurpassed management system.

Vision & Mission:

To provide the best quality product possible with the help of our highly skilled and dedicated
workforce. We pursue for excellence through continuous improvements while maintaining a
superior level of integrity in interactions with our business partners and associates. We are driven
by involvement, enthusiasm and energy, keeping a constant vigil on quality and fitting ourselves
to the changing times.

Objectives:
Our objective is to offer our clients the best required quality garments in the required quantities,
at the precise time and in the right place with the considerable price. To achieve these goals the
company adapts a policy to ensure its success and stability.

Different functional departments of Sepal Group:

Here is the list of all departments of Sepal group. These departments include the pre-production
departments, production and post-production departments. The supporting departments are also
listed here.

1. Marketing and business development department

2. Design department
3. Merchandising department
4. Pattern Making, CAD department
5. Sampling department
6. Fabric Store and fabric sourcing
 7. Trims and Accessory Store
8. Fabric Testing Lab
9. Production Planning and Control
10. Cutting department
11. Sewing department
12. Quality Control department
13. Machine Maintenance department
14. Garment washing department
15. Finishing department
16. Printing department
17. Embroidery department
18. Supporting departments in a garment factory

In the above pre-production and production departments are listed. To run the factory smoothly,
with production departments, one needs to setup some auxiliary departments. Some of the
supporting departments of a garment manufacturing setup are as followings:

1. Industrial Engineering Department

2. EDP / IT department
3. Accounting Department
4. Human Resource and Administration
5. Shipping and documentation

In this report we are going to discuss briefly about the functional area of Sepal group such as
Marketing and business development department, Merchandising department and Production
Planning and Control and their required information or sources of information for making proper
decision.
Functions of Production Planning Department:
Production planning and control (PPC) department of Sepal group plays an important role. PPC
department of Sepal group build-up strong relationship with the other departments to achieve
maximum output from the export order.

Strategic level:
 Task scheduling: It involves standardizing the priorities for each work and determining the
starting and finishing time for each process or operation. It gives a time table for
production, representing the total time period essential for the production of a specific
garment style. Scheduling is concerned with preparation of machine loads and fixation of
Starting and completion dates for each of the operations. Machines have to be loaded
according to their capability of performing the given task and according to their capacity.

 Loading production: Production planner delineates which garment style and how the
quantity has to be put into the production line.

 Patterns and markers: Pattern making, grading, and markers are a crucial part in planning
for production. Once markers of each style are finalized, one can easily calculate the yield
of fabric needed for production and in turn can order the fabric.

Tactical level:
 Estimation quantity and costs of production: The production planner estimates the daily
production based on garment style work content. Based on the estimated production rates,
production runs and operator involvement planner also estimate production cost per pieces.

 Material resource planning: It is the planning and creation of material requirement sheet
based on sample product and the specification sheet. The consumption of raw material such
as fabric, button, sewing thread, and twill tape and their costs are estimated.

 Facility location: For a garment industry that has multiple factories for production and are
set for specific products, the production planner has to identify which facility will be the
most appropriate for new orders.

 Capacity planning: The PPC department plays a vital role during booking of orders. They
have to provide information regarding quantity of order they could accept based on their
estimated production capacity.
Operational level:
 Process selection and planning: The operations required to finish an order differs from
garment style to style. Based on the buyer requirement, production planning section
decides on processes for the orders. Sometimes additional operations or processes are
removed to minimize the cost of production.

 Follow-Up and execution: The PPC department ensures that the order is moving in a
particular production line as per the production plan. Once the plans are set for a garment
run and delivery deadlines, one must institute strict follow-up procedures to ensure that the
plan is followed correctly. If the cutting room, for example, falls behind in its production
schedule, then the sewing and finishing lines must wait, leading to backlogs and missed
delivery deadlines for shipment. To avoid this, one must have a daily oversight of each step
and keep the rest of the line updated with any delays so that plans can be adjusted to pick
up the slack.

 Reduce loss: About 60-70% of the cost of the garment is in the fabric. As such, it is vital
that one orders appropriately and tracks the cutting room processes to keep errors to a
minimum. Effective production planning relies on the ability to order the appropriate
amount of fabric for a run and to realize no more than a 2-3% rate of error in cutting. That
means that the number of garment components produced should equal 97-98% of the
garment components cut.
 Department of
Production Planning

Levels & function

Strategic level Tactical level Operational level

Estimation Material Capacity

quantity resource planning
and cost planning

Task Loading Patterns Process Follow-Up Reduce

scheduling production and selection and loss
markers execution

(a) Information about priority of (a) Estimates the daily production

work or which task need to be
done first.
(b) Information about required
time need to complete the task
(c) Before load the machine, it is
important to know about its
model, capacity, capability and
performance.
(d) Utilize the latest computer
aided systems to develop patterns
and markers.
(e) Before making the first
incision into layers of fabric, they
must ensure that the fabric is
properly arranged.
by analyzing daily activity of the
factory.
(b) Analysis of the sample product
for ex. Quality of the sample,
price, quantity etc. for creation of
material.
(c)Analyze the market place and
best location for orders.
(d) Analyze the previous records
of balance between taking order
and giving delivery of product to
maintain the balance.
(e) Using (SAM) of the product:
(Standard allowed minute) to
calculate the costing.
(a).Analyze the buyer requirement
to process the orders of the
product.
(b) One must institute strict
follow-up procedures to ensure
that the plan is followed correctly.
(c) To reduce loss of the garment,
the number of garment
components produced should
equal 97-98% of the garment
components cut should be
maintained.
Functions of Marketing Department:
The marketing department of Sepal group is responsible for marketing products made by the
factory, finding new customers and bringing more and more orders for the company. The
marketing department is headed by the marketing manager and supported marketing team.
Effective marketing starts with a considered, well-informed marketing strategy. A good marketing
strategy helps define the garments vision, mission and business goals, and outlines the steps you
need to take to achieve these goals.

Strategic level:
 Marketing objectives: Setting up the objective is the first task done by the marketing
managers. For running a successful marketing campaign it is very essential that what the
team is going to do. Here making the right decision is the key to achieve the goal. Managers
should do SWOT analysis and then what requires to develop the present market or how to
increase the present value of the company. Then everything should go through in a proper
way by the analysis and make the objectives from the requirements or opportunities from
the above analysis.

 Marketing strategies: Strategies are the means of the process that objectives are achieved.
Objectives mean what is to be done and strategies means how is to be done. Marketing
strategies of the company are the important thing by which the operational decisions are
made and the marketing and corporate objectives achieved within the time periods
specified in the plan.

 Profile your potential customers: The marketing department do market research to develop
a profile of the customers they are targeting and identify their needs. The profile will reveal
their buying patterns, including how they buy, where they buy and what they buy. Again,
regularly review trends so you don't miss out on new opportunities or become irrelevant
with your marketing message. While they try to find new customers, they make sure the
marketing strategy that also allows to maintain relationships with your existing customers.

 Profile your competitors: Similarly, as part of marketing strategy the marketing department
develop a profile of their competitors by identifying their products, supply chains, pricing
and marketing tactics. They also identify the strengths and weaknesses of their own internal
processes to help improve performance compared with the competition.
Tactical level:
 Use the 4Ps of marketing: Identify the tactical marketing mix using the 4Ps of marketing.
Marketing is simplistically defined as ‘putting the right product in the right place, at the
right price, at the right time. It is most commonly executed through the 4 P's of marketing:
Price, Product, Promotion, and Place.

 Brand and Price Positioning: Giving thorough consideration to available information

regarding customer needs and define desired Brand and Price Positioning which will form
the platform for key communication messages.

 Advertising and Promotional Campaigning: Once the enterprise has a product to sell, it is
the responsibility of the Marketing Department to promote the product and the brand. This
will be performed through the help of the creative team by creating campaigns, events,
advertisements, as well as promotional material. Such promotional material is used to
promote the product, services, and brand to the public in order to create awareness and to
convert prospects into customers. The marketing department is provided with a budget for
promotion, and it has to design its promotional activities within the budget. The marketing
department also manages the social media marketing for businesses. It does so with the
help of social media experts who design and implement the strategy to promote the
business and its product on the internet, create a buzz and utilize that buzz to attract
customers and improve sales.

Operational level:
 Producing marketing and promotional materials: Marketing department creates the
materials that describe and promote the core products and services. They should be kept
up-to-date as those products and services evolve.

 Listening to customer needs: To establish a marketing strategy, it’s necessary to get closer
to the clients and listen in order to find out what their needs are. It’s a marketing department
task, to plan the necessary means for receiving customer feedback:
 Help improve sales processes and customer: As mentioned above, it’s the responsibility of
the marketing department to know the users and especially the customers’ feelings.
 Department of
Marketing

Levels & functions

Strategic level Tactical level Operational level

Use 4Ps of Brand and Advertising &

marketing Price promotional
Positioning campaign

Define Define Profile Producing Listening Help

Marketing Marketing your marketing and to improve
objectives strategies competitor promotional customer sales
s materials needs processes
and
customer

(a) Doing SWOT (strengths,

weaknesses, opportunities, and
threats) analysis of the market to
determine the marketing objectives.
(b) To set up a marketing strategy
the marketing department needs to
analyze the Customer Service, cost
reduction and improve productivity
to get required information.
(c) Develop a profile of competitors
by identifying their products,
supply chains, pricing and
marketing tactics.
(d) Develop a profile of targeting
customers and identify their needs
by revealing their buying patterns,
including how they buy, where they
buy and what they buy.
(a) Need to perform Sales analysis
(a) Identify the tactical marketing
by regions, customer class and
mix analyzing the 4Ps (Price,
sales person to get required
Product, Promotion, and Place) of information.
marketing including
Functionality, Quality, Warranty, (b) Staying closer to customers
Packaging, Repairs & support and listen in order to find out what
their needs are.
(b) To position the brand and price
(c) Know the users and especially
it’s important to determine how
the customers’ feelings to improve
the brand is currently positioning
the sales process.
itself, Compare brand positioning
to competitors to identify (d) Analyze the market share and
uniqueness. Analyze the trends.
competitor branding strategy.
(c) It is necessary to analyze target
audience's attitudes and/or
behaviors to make successful
advertise and promotional
activities.
Functions of HR department:
Strategic level:
 Recruitment and Selection: Recruitment is the process of captivating, screening, and
selecting potential and qualified candidates based on objective criteria for a particular job.
Recruitment and selection process is very important to every organization because it
reduces the costs of mistakes such as engaging incompetent, unmotivated, and
underqualified employees. Firing the unqualified candidate and hiring the new employee
is again an expensive process.

 Training and Development: Training and development are the indispensable functions of
human resource management. It is the attempt to improve the current or future performance
of an employee by increasing the ability of an employee through educating and increasing
one’s skills or knowledge in the particular subject.

 Orientation: Giving intensive orientation to the employee is one of the major functions of
human resource management. The program should help the employee to know his assigned
duties and his exact job description, job role, and the relationship of position to other
positions in the organization. It gives clarification to the employee to take an active role in
the organization.

Maintaining Good Working Conditions: It is the responsibility of the human resource management
to provide good working conditions to the employee so that they may like the workplace and the
work environment. It is the fundamental duty of the HR department to motivate the employees.
The study has been found that employees don’t contribute to the goals of the organization as much
as they can. This is because of the lack of motivation.
Managing Employee Relations: Employees are the pillars of any organization. Employee
relationship is a very broad concept and it is one of the crucial functions of human resource
management. It also helps to foster good employee relations. They have the ability to influence
behaviors and work outputs.