Many times throughout the year, people will come to WaterShed and we’ll give them a tour of our facility. It’s pretty exciting to show it off and see eyes light up at everything involved to produce a garment. It’s actually a pretty impressive process. Sometimes we’re just so busy we don’t get to give as many tours as we’d like – SO today – I’m going to give you a virtual one!
When you walk passed our receptionist desk, you’ll find a huge area dedicated to warehousing all of our materials. This is where you will see all of our Gore-Tex®, Nitrile, Neoprene and Polyurethane just waiting to be cut out into raingear. Samples from these materials get tested for PSI standards before they get cut. That way we guarantee your gear will be 100% waterproof.
So how does that material get cut into jackets? Walk up a flight of stairs, through a pair of swinging doors and you have stepped into our cutting room. This is where we house our Lectra® cutting machine and Gerber® spreader – the place where all the magic happens and keeps us producing in large quantities.
When you place an order with us, it goes through our lovely CSR team to process and send out to production to create “mini-markers.” These mini markers are copies of what style is to be cut, how the pattern pieces will be cut out onto material, and how much yardage will be needed. The order and the mini-marker stays with the order throughout the whole production process.
From that point, our Warehouse Manager – Dan, will put the rolls of fabric onto the automatic Gerber® spreader and input the yardage of fabric needed for each cut layer. The order is cut to the exact amount needed in order to produce the best yields possible and to decrease the amount of fabric waste. It cuts down on the time that it would take to cut each piece by hand and helps us stay efficient. These layers are passed down the table to the Lectra® cutting machine.
From there, our Cutting Manager – Jerry, will take the mini marker and pull the layers of fabric onto a vacuum table that suctions and conveyers the fabric as the knife automatically cuts out the pieces. The order and mini-marker are picked up and rolled together into a bundle that gets passed onto our pre-production team. Pre-production pulls together a “recipe” of zippers, velcro, tags and other findings that go into the finishing of the garment.
The bundles of cut garments are piled up and rolled onto a cart to send over to our sewing floor. Each bundle is distributed to our team of sewers who sews up the order. Many of our sewers work in teams in order to finish projects. Someone will work on one part and pass it on to the next person – so every person involved is an expert at their job which is one reason our gear looks so great.
Once a garment is sewn, it needs to be taped with seam tape in order to make the garment completely waterproof. This is an intensive process that requires a lot of time and concentration in order make sure the garments are completely sealed from any water coming in and getting you wet. It’s the step that truly makes raingear 100% waterproof.
Once a garment is completely taped, it’s ready to go downstairs to our finishing room where all the final touches are added. Snaps, hemming, tagging and folding are all done in here by finishing crew. Garments are ready to be sent to our shipping department to get sent out to you or your business!
That is our production process in a nutshell. Please contact us if you are interested in doing a tour of our facility – We’d be happy to show you around!
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