Nearly 100 of the world’s leading dyes houses now choose the natific Color Accreditation Program (CAP) as the means of earning straight-to-production privileges (i.e. to cut out the common process of lab dip submission and first production approval). Every CAP Mill around the world are specialists and leaders in their field, each month natific randomly selects a CAP mill to feature with a company profile.
We would also like to take this opportunity to welcome new and returning software and service clients with a short announcement, including a special notice to all CAP members.
CONGRATULATIONS to Gunzetal Thread Company!
The Gunzetal mill just finished their first audit after signing up for the CAP program around Christmas and preparing for the Under Armour CAP in a remarkable speed of less than 2 weeks. As the February CAP mill profile of the month, we were curious to know more about the mill, located in Guangzhou, China.
We took the opportunity to talk with Beat Hofer, the lead auditor and Head of Technical Operations at natific.
What is the mill’s niche area?
Polyester sewing thread
What retailers/brands is the mill working with within the program?
Under Armour
What CAP program did you carry out at the Gunzetal mill?
Among a total of 100 CAP accredited mills, Guangzhou Gunzetal is the first CAP accredited Polyester sewing thread dye-house in the world. I audited the Yarn Exhaust dye house, one of their two sites that were equipped with high temperature dyeing machines with capacities from 1 kg up to 500 kg.
What CAP Performance Level could you assign after the audit?
A CAP level 4. The competent and well-prepared staff was able to achieve a good level of CAP performance immediately. Achieving level 4 demonstrates their color management competence to safely go straight to production as soon as the color is specified by the brand/retailer. It also shows that they are among the best operations globally.
Is it possible to get some inside info about how the mill performed during the audit?
When checking the mill’s lab-matching capabilities, the requested challenging test colors (qtx files) were all successfully matched in 2 to 4 lab trials. Dye-stuff combinations were selected that will fulfill the fastness requirements to leading brands quality standards with no issues with metamerism.
Metamerism remains a big issue in the dyeing industry (especially for sewing thread yarn). By being able to avoid it, the mill will match the colors under all specified illuminants, ensuring color coordination between the thread and the fabric to be sewn.
That is good news for all supply chain participants, anything else you would like to share?
Color fastness is another common issue at final products. For polyester dyeing, dyestuff selection and a well-controlled reduction clear process (removing unfixed dye-stuff from the fiber) will give optimum color fastness properties. I am glad to say that all dyeing processes at Gunzetal are state-of-the art, including a controlled reduction clear processes for achieving optimum fastness properties.
Did you notice anything else on site that will affect the final product?
Yes, for example their yarn winding machines with integrated accurate yarn lubrication. Good quality and uniform lubrication of sewing threads will avoid yarn bursts, allowing a hassle-free usage on sewing machines.
What happens now for the mill?
The mill receives a comprehensive report with required and recommended actions. For example, in the past the mills process was for the 1st production to be made as the standard, with the aim to keep all production as near as possible to the first production lot. When going forward and as CAP accredited the retailer’s master digital standard will now be matched for all production lots.
This month we are happy to welcome our new and returning retailers/brands, vendors and mills as software and service clients. Natific is looking forward to our new and continued relationships.
RETAILERS/BRANDS
Consultancy
Mountain Works (Sweden)
VENDORS & MILLS
Brand Certifications
LT Apparel Group Ltd. (United States)
ColorWarehouse (on-line system to monitor and track on-going color production)
Kunshan Lily Textile Co., Ltd. (China)
Shandong Weilian Printing Dyeing (China)
Textiles Color Real, S.A. (Guatemala)
Delicacy Industrial Co., Ltd. (Taiwan)
Global Dyeing (Viet Nam)
Little King Ind. Co., Ltd. (Taiwan)
ASAP (on-line system to request and manage all color developments)
A&H Sportswear (United States)
Brimadona Industrial Co., Ltd. (Taiwan)
Global Challenge Co., Ltd. (South Korea)
Digjam Ltd. (India)
Tien-Hu Trading Ltd. (Hong Kong)
Yixing Lucky Dyeing, Printing, and Finishing Co., Ltd. (China)
SPECIAL NOTICE FOR ALL CAP MEMBERS
Below companies have successfully participated and received the CAP report and relevant CAP level. Please reach out to your respective retailer/brand and ask for your self-approval privileges.
Delicacy Industrial Co., Ltd. (Taiwan) – (Exhaust)
Na Young Sik Industrial Co., Ltd. (South Korea) – (Exhaust Yarn)
Y.R.C. Textile Co., Ltd. (Thailand) – (CAP Exhaust)
Men Chuen Fibre Industry Co., Ltd. (Taiwan) – (CAP Exhaust)
Guangzhou Gunzetal Company Ltd. (China) – (CAP Exhaust Yarn)
More about the CAP program. A unique level of transparency is provided through the Program together with the ColorWarehouse system, allowing the mill, vendor and retailer/brand to continuously monitor the status and statistics of their total coloration performance through metrics that quantify their accuracy and precision.
Going from a traditional process to the process of the future, mills can be pre-approved on some or all palette colors and no longer be required to submit lab dips or first of production for approval. The CAP is not a pass or fail audit. The program is designed to evaluate the maturity and capability of a mill, determining if a mill will be able to produce any given color to a specific tolerance. It is intended to assess, educate and help mills move towards best practice through production analysis and expert recommendations. Once the assessment is completed, a CAP level is assigned through ColorWarehouse and the mill will have a list of required and recommended actions to be completed. The process score is a formula to calculate what 99% of all production would look like.
The program was developed as a collaborative project with retailers, and has evolved to be the most comprehensive color accreditation program globally. natific’s different certification programs have been carried out at over 500 global factories including the world’s leading mills that are members of the CAP program.
The ColorWarehouse is an online data warehouse that stores transmitted spectral and other data such as season and style for all production batches. This information is uploaded for all CAP participating retailer’s colors. It serves mills by permitting them to analyze production data based on color, fabric and dyeing machine. This provides the mill, vendors and retailers/brands with insight into the mills daily production operations and efficiency.
Contact us at support@natific.com if you have specific questions or would like to know more, we would love to hear from you!