F&A Trade Show ends on positive note

10 Jun '10

6 min read

Mr. Rakesh Parakh, Marketing Manager, Pioneer Embroideries Ltd., noted: “The trade visitors were top quality. We hope to convert many of the contacts we made here into regular business.”

Mr. A. Bhoobalan, General Manager - Trims Division, Bombay Rayon Fashions Ltd.: said: As far as we are concerned, we have got a good response, potential visitors, potential enquiries. We also had a lot of foreigners visiting our stall. They came from Sri Lanka, Hong Kong and Russia amongst others.

“We are very happy! We met a lot of good and potential customers. We'll surely be here the next time with a bigger stall!” signed off Mr. Margin Dunn, Sales Manager, The Lurex Company Ltd., who had flown in specially for this event from U.K.

Business Networking Forum 2010
A major highlight of the Fabrics & Accessories Trade Show was the Business Networking Forum that had the cream from the industry to address critical issues that affected the textile value chain.

“The BNF was a unique networking forum provider and offered a conference-cum-interaction platform with a difference,” said Dr. P.R. Roy, Chairman, Business Networking Forum who is Director of fibre2fashion and Member-Board of Directors of Malwa Group and NSL Textiles.

The 3 topics discussed by high-powered panels were as follows:

Day-1, 4th June 2010: Deciphering the Unique Identity (USP) of the Textiles & Clothing Industry in India and the sub-continent

In the opening session was chaired by Dr Darlie O'Koshy, Director-General of Institute of Apparel Management, Ravi Toshniwal (Joint MD of Banswara Syntex) identified product innovation as India's strength while Shreyas Joshi (President, Raymond Apparel) expressed confidence in Indian companies' ability to compete effectively through a combination of product development, quality and customer service. Harminder Sahni (MD, Wazir Advisors) expressed a concern that possibly other than polyester, not enough fundamental research and development was being done on other fibre categories.

Day-2, 5th June 2010: Integrated Supply Chain for the Textiles and Clothing Industry – how to get there?

In the session chaired by Vikram Rao (Business Director, Acrylic Fibre & Overseas Spinning, Aditya Birla Group), the panel discussed extensively on the divide between various links in the apparel and textiles value chain; Ashish Kumar (Business Head, Integra Apparel) emphasizes on following a transparent standard minute costing approach while Christopher Hogg (Group CEO, Sildorex Lurex) spoke on the usage of metallized yarns in industrial manufacturing.

The second session of the day was chaired by Bijou Kurien (President & Chief Executive of Lifestyle Business of Reliance Retail) debated why apparel & lifestyle brands in India are still relatively small in size as compared to developed countries. J Suresh (CEO of Arvind Brands) and Arun Sirdeshmukh (President & CEO, Apparel Business, Reliance Trends) both were in agreement that growth of brands had concentrated on a small upper income segment in a few of the larger cities. Devangshu Dutta (Third Eyesight) said there is a tremendous opportunity if costing and pricing breakthroughs can be achieved.

Day-3, 6th June 2010: Public-Private Partnership in Clothing & Textiles: Is the Convergence desirable? If yes, to what extent is it feasible” Are we heading for Social Marketing in India?

The session, chaired by HS Bhaskar (CEO, Gokak Textiles) had participation by the Textiles Commissioner of Karnataka, besides other industry experts. The final session of the BNF was on Social Marketing, which was chaired by Prof Atanu Ghosh of IIM-Ahmedabad.

S S Textile Media Pvt Ltd

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