The Hindu : Front Page : Textile units now focus on branding

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Jun 16, 2006

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Front Page

Textile units now focus on branding

M. Soundariya Preetha

NEW LOOK: P. Sundar Rajan, Managing Director of S.P.Apparels Ltd., which acquired Crocodile Products Pvt. Ltd. recently. - Photo: K. Ananthan

COIMBATORE: Prodded on by the domestic market's growing appetite for branded garments, some of the leading textile units here now focus on acquiring or building a brand in the domestic market.

S.P. Apparels, a garment exporter here, recently acquired Crocodile Products Private Limited. Tubeknit Fashions, a Tirupur-based garment exporter, plans to build a brand for their men and women's wear in the domestic market. A couple of textile mills in Coimbatore are also having similar proposals. Most of these units are into exports now and have an integrated production facility.

International quality

According to P. Sundar Rajan, Managing Director of S.P. Apparels, these units will be able to provide garments of international quality in the domestic market since they have capabilities such as design studio and now supply to some of the leading buyers in the European and the U.S. markets.

Though Tubeknit Fashions proposes brand development at a later date, it is on the cards, says its Managing director, P. Parthasarathi. "We already have the manufacturing facilities. This will help in developing a brand for the domestic market," he asserts.

Pointing out the potential for branded garments, the executive director of KPR Mills, C.R. Ananda Krishnan, says: "In cities such as Bangalore, young men and women prefer to buy branded western wear."

And, the branding exercise is not just for garments. SCM Textile Spinners here came out with a brand for yarn made in their mills (Madras Yarn) about five months ago. Though this was initially for exports, the company is now looking at establishing the brand in the local market too. Some of the firms with high end export orders now ask for this yarn and the volume of sale has also gone up, says an official of the company.

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