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My cousin started a small business selling socks a few years back. I've been working with her to help improve the business and make things more efficient. One of the least efficient aspects currently is the hand application of crystals which adorn the socks. This is currently done in-home by herself with great expense in time and a large margin for error which is not at all scalable when she gets large orders in. I've come up with a few different ideas for how to speed up the process but I'm definitely not an expert in this area by any means. What i'm looking for is any of the following: 1) Someone who can engineer a better way to apply the crystals 2) Someone who can develop tooling or templating to make the process faster and idiot proof 3) Someone who can actually do the application of the crystals at a reasonable cost for a small business I don't really know where to start my search and so I was hoping someone here might know. I should also mention that ideally we want to keep this process in the US. We're currently in SoCal.
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Oct 11, 2018 02:32
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Sounds like you need a Bedazzler.
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Oct 11, 2018 14:50
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Ivan Yurkinov posted:Sounds like you need a Bedazzler. Well, perhaps someone with extensive experience and tools for bedazzling. If we used an actual "bedazzler" tool to do the work it would be much slower than our current method.
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Oct 11, 2018 19:40
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Hey OP, try drawing the sock on a sheet of cardboard, and then draw where the gem would go so you can line it up
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Oct 13, 2018 16:35
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Stinky_Pete posted:Hey OP, try drawing the sock on a sheet of cardboard, and then draw where the gem would go so you can line it up I don't really want to give too much away about our current procedure, but I can tell you that we're beyond that. We apply about half of the crystals all at once, and the other half at one time as well. But sometimes they dont line up perfectly and we have to manually fix one here and there. But I'd like to be able to do it all with one pass, and basically am wondering who I could talk to that's smart enough to tell me/show me/actually do this for me.
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Oct 13, 2018 19:56
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So you are buying socks made in Southern Califonia?
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Oct 13, 2018 20:31
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Elephanthead posted:So you are buying socks made in Southern Califonia? Currently the socks themselves are made in China. We are looking at finding a stateside manufacturer for the socks as well. But the rest of the assembly and packaging takes place locally, which technically makes them "Assembled in USA" as far as manufacturing goes. I don't really care if they are assembled local to SoCal or not, but prefer it to be done in the USA.
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Oct 15, 2018 01:20
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Did you mean a small margin of error
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Oct 15, 2018 04:34
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Spokes posted:Did you mean a small margin of error Well, I would call it a large margin. Probably 30% of the socks have to be manually corrected a bit, which isn't very difficult, but it does add quite a bit of time to the process. Hence the need for a better process.
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Oct 15, 2018 08:01
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without knowing a lot about what you are doing or what the patterns look like it what the beads look like or the geometry of the beads or the geometry of the socks or I guess making a metal template and raking the gems over it don’t work, or doing that with a makeshift soft press isn’t working
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Oct 16, 2018 17:38
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Tim Thomas posted:without knowing a lot about what you are doing or what the patterns look like it what the beads look like or the geometry of the beads or the geometry of the socks or That's essentially what we are doing now, but its time consuming and not very efficient. I'm sure there's very expensive machinery to do this for you, so probably I just need to find someone who has that machinery and have them do it cheaper/better/faster. I just don't really know where to look for that.
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Oct 19, 2018 00:01
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bEatmstrJ posted:That's essentially what we are doing now, but its time consuming and not very efficient. I'm sure there's very expensive machinery to do this for you, so probably I just need to find someone who has that machinery and have them do it cheaper/better/faster. I just don't really know where to look for that. Comedy option: sell the defects as "factory seconds" for 25% off, or put them up on Etsy as "hand made" and charge twice as much. So real answer, you might want to look at custom automation suppliers: https://www.thomasnet.com/southern-california/custom-automation-equipment-2251502-1.html Here's one that looks somewhat promising: http://www.automationanswersinc.com/ I'm in automation, but not clothing, so I don't know anything about what machines are typical... but just about any custom automation shop can engineer and build something for you. These custom automation shops are usually small 15-20 person outfits, and their bread and butter is small companies who need custom solutions for whatever unique widget they make. Another place to look is your local electrical distributors...anyone who distributes Allen-Bradley, Schneider, Mitsubishi, Siemens, etc. electrical equipment will probably know all the custom machine manufacturers in your area, and might even know the industry-specific machine builders that make exactly what you want. Something to note, if you haven't done this already then make sure the machine will eventually pay for itself. You REALLY need to know how much the rework is actually costing you before you even look at a new machine. Doesn't matter if it's custom or off-the-shelf, you need to be able to justify the purchase. DaveSauce fucked around with this message at 15:14 on Oct 19, 2018 |
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Oct 19, 2018 14:48
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bEatmstrJ posted:My cousin started a small business selling socks a few years back. I've been working with her to help improve the business and make things more efficient. One of the least efficient aspects currently is the hand application of crystals which adorn the socks. This is currently done in-home by herself with great expense in time and a large margin for error which is not at all scalable when she gets large orders in. I've come up with a few different ideas for how to speed up the process but I'm definitely not an expert in this area by any means. From the information given it is hard to tell your best route. How much revenue are you guys currently pulling in? Is this all at home or do you lease a dedicated space too? Assuming your operation is large enough to warrant outside investigation then you'll want to consider an engineering consultant. If you feel your sock design is itself sound then probably a firm that focuses on industrial engineering would be suitable. They can help optimize your processes to eliminate waste. Since you're in SoCal there are probably a ton of such firms. Call around and see what they'll offer and quote for estimates.
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Oct 22, 2018 18:53
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DaveSauce posted:Comedy option: sell the defects as "factory seconds" for 25% off, or put them up on Etsy as "hand made" and charge twice as much. Thank you. This is decent advice and I'll check this out.
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Oct 24, 2018 00:21
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Raldikuk posted:From the information given it is hard to tell your best route. How much revenue are you guys currently pulling in? Is this all at home or do you lease a dedicated space too? We're currently in about 40 local retailers and have produced and sold close to 10k pairs so far. It's all done from home, currently not full-time. But its getting to the point where manufacturing is a bottleneck and taking away from us growing the business. An engineering consultant is probably what I'm looking for, I guess I just didn't know what they were called and where to look for them. I'll start here and see if it leads anywhere.
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Oct 24, 2018 00:24
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Hi, congrats on the success so far. You've gotten a lot of great starting points so far, there are a lot of companies that just come in and automate manufacturing. I've usually heard then referred to as system integrators. Engineering consultants is a good idea as well. I would also say that it is a different skillset that makes machines to make millions of things versus bringing new products to market. [Edit: That was not to say that you don't want to or shouldn't get into manufacturing. It's cool and can be super fun and interesting, but you are making things in your house and I think that moving manufacturing to another space and that responsibility to another party might free you both up to focus on getting more product into more stores.] It sounds like your cousin might be in a position to find a contract manufacturer who can just handle the manufacturing so they can focus on growing the brand. I'd do some internet searching for contract garment manufacturers and reach out to them. Here are two examples I saw. argylehaus 5 thread Hotbod Handsomeface fucked around with this message at 15:10 on Oct 25, 2018 |
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Oct 25, 2018 06:33
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Hotbod Handsomeface posted:Hi, congrats on the success so far. Those are both great leads. Might be exactly what I'm looking for. Even if they can't do the crystals we are looking to make the socks in the US as well so I'll look into this. Thank you!
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Oct 25, 2018 23:47
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Hotbod Handsomeface posted:
System integrators just do programming usually, and also they build control panels (boxes that have the controller and wiring terminations). They don't usually design or build machines, but they know how to make the machines sing and dance. On top of that they do plant-wide automation to "integrate" everything together. So they will help get a bunch of different machines talking to each other so they can work together more seamlessly.
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Oct 26, 2018 03:56
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How are the gems physically attached to the sock? If you're using adhesives then a Pick & Place machine for assembling components to printed circuit boards can probably be adapted to your process with minimal modification.
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Jan 17, 2019 14:50
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shame on an IGA posted:How are the gems physically attached to the sock? If you're using adhesives then a Pick & Place machine for assembling components to printed circuit boards can probably be adapted to your process with minimal modification. Its called "Hot Fix", which is just melted adhesive that is already applied to the gems when you buy them. It takes about 20 seconds @350 degrees to full adhere the stones, typically done with a heat press similar to what you would use for t-shirt iron-ons.
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Jan 17, 2019 18:36
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At this point where manufacturing is the bottleneck and you may start a little facility, you could maybe try to find a mentor. Like a much bigger clothing or manufacturing company that wants to give back and show your cousin what's up with actually doing small scale manufacturing. Professional networks, LinkedIn, and even nearby college business departments may be able to help. Especially the latter because they love testimonials that they are supporting local entrepreneurs and all that jazz.
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Jan 17, 2019 22:07
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shame on an IGA posted:How are the gems physically attached to the sock? If you're using adhesives then a Pick & Place machine for assembling components to printed circuit boards can probably be adapted to your process with minimal modification. Sounds expensive. Pick and place is great for doing a variety of patterns, or custom patterns, but I would think it's overkill for this application. Plus programming new patterns would be a pain. This would also assume the gems come on a reel or some other sort of controlled feed, rather than loose product. I'm assuming the patterns are pretty repetitive, or do you have a ton of different patterns? I'm imagining the current process involves a template/jig that has holes for all the gems. So you put the sock down, then you lay the template over it. The operator manually places the gems in the holes of the template, and then you apply a plate/press that puts pressure on it. Once everything is secure, then activate a heater for a certain amount of time to activate and set the adhesive. I'd expect your rework is when an operator puts the wrong gem, or misses a gem... or if a gem is place upside-down. Have you considered just duplicating your existing setup and hiring a second operator? Automation could, in the long run, both increase your throughput and lower your cost, but it's a much higher initial investment and therefore a longer break-even. So if cost isn't currently an issue, it may be worth just doubling up on what you have to increase throughput. Maybe start someone part-time for a while?
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Jan 17, 2019 22:23
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DaveSauce posted:Sounds expensive. Pick and place is great for doing a variety of patterns, or custom patterns, but I would think it's overkill for this application. Plus programming new patterns would be a pain. This would also assume the gems come on a reel or some other sort of controlled feed, rather than loose product. Its not quite like that, but you're certainly on the right track. We've actually made a number of improvements to the process since I posted this thread, but ultimately the manufacturing part needs to be outsourced to someone with expensive machines. All of our patterns are the same, just a straight line with alternating sizes, very basic stuff. The basic process for us is applying transfer tape to a row of pre-aligned gems, stretching the sock over a plastic template and applying the transfer tape to the template to line the gems up on the sock. Stick the whole thing in the heat-press a few at a time and you're done. We can do about 12-15pr an hour with this method, but when you start getting orders for hundreds of pairs that are due in a few days its hard to keep up.
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Jan 20, 2019 01:27
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bEatmstrJ posted:Its not quite like that, but you're certainly on the right track. We've actually made a number of improvements to the process since I posted this thread, but ultimately the manufacturing part needs to be outsourced to someone with expensive machines. All of our patterns are the same, just a straight line with alternating sizes, very basic stuff. As much as I hate to say this, get on Alibaba and start contacting the customer contacts for sock manufacturers out of their items for sale list. Ask them to give you a contact for custom product manufacture and start talking numbers. Also, start talking to other people who have actually done overseas manufacturing to get them to walk you through the pitfalls. I wish I could say to go with a US-based manufacturer, but (1) you're small and have to compete on margins with massive firms who do use sweatshops, and (2) there's sweet gently caress-all of reliable affordable on-shore manufacturers who will give you the time of day compared to pulling an overseas manufacturer.
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Jan 20, 2019 02:30
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She's doing all that sequentially? Hire a couple more laborers and break the tasks down, I'd guess 1 person applying stones to tape, one lining up tape on the templated socks, and one working the press and stretching socks over the empty templates. You'll see big gains by parallellizing, any step in that process shouldn't be taking 120 seconds.
shame on an IGA fucked around with this message at 23:04 on Jan 21, 2019 |
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Jan 21, 2019 22:58
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shame on an IGA posted:She's doing all that sequentially? Hire a couple more laborers and break the tasks down, I'd guess 1 person applying stones to tape, one lining up tape on the templated socks, and one working the press and stretching socks over the empty templates. You'll see big gains by parallellizing, any step in that process shouldn't be taking 120 seconds. whats up david hume
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Jan 22, 2019 17:29
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shame on an IGA posted:She's doing all that sequentially? Hire a couple more laborers and break the tasks down, I'd guess 1 person applying stones to tape, one lining up tape on the templated socks, and one working the press and stretching socks over the empty templates. You'll see big gains by parallellizing, any step in that process shouldn't be taking 120 seconds. Its usually done in batches. Enough to do a 6pr batch at a time. We recently found someone who can sell us the gems (at a reduced price) already fastened to transfer tape. Fixing the gems to the transfer tape was one of the most time consuming parts so this was a great boost to efficiency. The heat press part could only really be sped up by getting another heat press, but for now we can just get the next batch of socks ready for the heat press while the first batch is being pressed, so there isn't a lot of waiting or wasted time. She did recently hire a part-time employee to help with production so that's good, but ultimately outsourcing will be the way to go because right now too much time is being wasted making socks and not growing the business.
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Jan 22, 2019 19:57
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rename the business Sock It To Me LLC where do I send the invoice
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Jun 2, 2019 04:14
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Well since the thread's been necro'd, any updates?
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Jun 4, 2019 21:30
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shame on an IGA posted:Well since the thread's been necro'd, any updates? We've managed to speed up the manufacturing process significantly with the use of some improved templates and changes to the way they are done, but unfortunately my cousin is still a bit too stubborn to let go of the manufacturing herself and hasn't looked into outsourcing anything as of yet. Eventually she will run into scaling issues and not have a choice, but I'm trying to prepare her for that more gracefully. But otherwise, business is still growing and we've been focused more on marketing lately.
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Jun 7, 2019 02:20
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