National Institute Of Fashion Technology, Kolkata

Bachelor Of Fashion Technology – Semester VI

Training And Development Of Supervisor

Assignment - I

Topic : Prepare a Quality Program for an Apparel industry

Submitted By:

Ankita Ranjan (07)

Introduction

Quality control, or QC for short, is a process by which entities review the quality of all
factors involved in production. ISO 9000 defines quality control as "A part of quality
management focused on fulfilling quality requirements".
This approach places an emphasis on three aspect:

1. Elements such as controls, job management, defined and well managed

processes, performance and integrity criteria, and identification of records
2. Competence, such as knowledge, skills, experience, and qualifications
3. Soft elements, such as personnel, integrity, confidence, organizational
culture, motivation, team spirit, and quality relationships.
Controls include product inspection, where every product is examined visually, and often
using a stereo microscope for fine detail before the product is sold into the external market.
Inspectors will be provided with lists and descriptions of unacceptable product defects such
as cracks or surface blemishes for example.
The quality of the outputs is at risk if any of these three aspects is deficient in any way.
Quality control emphasizes testing of products to uncover defects and reporting to
management who make the decision to allow or deny product release, whereas quality
assurance attempts to improve and stabilize production (and associated processes) to avoid,
or at least minimize, issues which led to the defect(s) in the first place. For contract work,
particularly work awarded by government agencies, quality control issues are among the top
reasons for not renewing a contract.

Quality control (QC) is a procedure or set of procedures intended to ensure that a

manufactured product or performed service adheres to a defined set of quality criteria or
meets the requirements of the client or customer.

QC is similar to, but not identical with, quality assurance (QA). QA is defined as a procedure
or set of procedures intended to ensure that a product or service under development (before
work is complete, as opposed to afterwards) meets specified requirements. QA is sometimes
expressed together with QC as a single expression, quality assurance and control (QA/QC).

In order to implement an effective QC program, an enterprise must first decide which

specific standards the product or service must meet. Then the extent of QC actions must be
determined (for example, the percentage of units to be tested from each lot). Next, real-world
data must be collected (for example, the percentage of units that fail) and the results reported
to management personnel. After this, corrective action must be decided upon and taken (for
example, defective units must be repaired or rejected and poor service repeated at no charge
until the customer is satisfied). If too many unit failures or instances of poor service occur, a
plan must be devised to improve the production or service process and then that plan must be
put into action. Finally, the QC process must be ongoing to ensure that remedial efforts, if
required, have produced satisfactory results and to immediately detect recurrences or new
instances of trouble.

Factors influencing customer’s perception of quality-

 Price: price is used by some shoppers in quality estimates

 Technology: factors such as fabric and seam strength, colorfastness, shrinkage which
are affected by the state of technology used
 Psychology: a garment can be reasonably priced and the best that technology can
offer, but if it is not attractive in appearance, if it is not fashionable, if it does not meet
customer’s requirements, it is not quality garment
 Time orientation: durability – children’s garments are expected to be more durable
than ladies’ high fashion garments
 Contractual: refers to product guarantee, refund policy etc
 Ethical: refers to honesty of advertising, courtesy of sales personnel etc

Six benefits of quality

 Greater market share

 Higher earnings
 Loyal customers
 Higher growth rate
 Premium price
 Highly motivated employees

Importance of Quality

 Profit can be the motivating factor for quality

 Quality can be used as a product differentiation strategy in the market
 Easiest way to make money is to stop losing it through poor quality and customers
who never return
 Best way to be profitable is to have repeat customers
 It is more expensive to bring in new customers than it is to retain the existing
customers
 Some companies are even calculating how much a customer is worth over his/her
lifetime
 Logic is – if you can retain a customer over his/her entire lifetime, then you made
that much money
 The consumer quality expectations have gone up
 Consumer is too busy to come back and complain
 Consumer is not interested to take special care of the product
 Consumer spending on apparel has reduced
  Stringent consumer protection laws
 Stores cannot afford a dissatisfied customer
 Working with non-quality vendors is costly

Quality in the Garment Industry

 Still at inspection level – AQL

 Quality is inspected into the product.
 A few firms are attempting SPC.
 Still a long way to go to finally reach global quality standards

Why improve quality?

 FOB is getting lesser

 Delivery time is getting lesser
 Costs are increasing.
 We need to keep providing better service to hold the buyers’ attention.
o Provide indisputable quality
o Provide indisputable quality at better costs.

Quality Program requirements

The Quality Program Requirements are based on the PDCA Cycle.

Process Cycle

 Understanding the customers' quality requirements.

 Organizing & training quality control department.

  Ensuring proper flow of quality requirements to the QC department.

 Ensuring proper flow of quality requirements to the Production Department.

 Establishing quality plans, parameters, inspection systems, frequency, sampling

techniques, etc..

 Inspection, testing, measurements as per plan.

 Record deviations

 Feed back to Production Department.

 Plan for further improvement.

Establishing Quality Control Program

The first step for quality control is to understand, establish & accept the customers' quality
requirements. This involves the following steps:

 Getting customers specifications regarding the quality

 Referring our past performance

 Discussing with the Quality Control Department

 Discussing with the Production Department

 Giving the Feed Back to the customers

 Receiving the revised quality requirements from the customers

 Accepting the quality parameters

Case Study
Quality assurance is not a tick the box activity and it can be a daunting task for
under-resourced manufacturers. They may always violate or avoid quality practices.
This research paper examined quality control points of a co-operative which is based
in a township setting in Dhaka.
Name Of Factory: A.J. Fashions Limited
Address: 2, Monipuripara Tejgaon, Dhaka-1215
Basic Products: Vests, T-shirts, Shirts, Shirt, Blouse, School Wear, Fashion Wear
Working Area: 200,000sqf
Production: 100,000 pcs per month
The co-operative enterprise was founded in 1978, although small in size it has 40
domestic sewing machines,
 2 industrial sewing machines,
 4 button hole machines,
  4 over-lockers,
 2 industrial irons,
 2 industrial cutting machines and 2 cutting tables as resources used in their clothing
production process.
This cooperative has showcased its work in Turkey and the Netherlands in world
fashion shows. Given limited resources the co-operative has focused its quality
assurance efforts on pattern, stitch and material quality as key quality control points
and this has sustained the co-operative’s ability to remain in the sewing enterprise
for 48 years. It should be noted that this co-operative has had changes in other
leadership roles, but the chairperson responsible for operations has never changed a
role since the establishment of the co-operative. All efforts of quality management
in this cooperative aim to deliver a total quality finish on any garment or set of
garments.
 This response from the co-operative reflects a commitment to quality management
and control and, this type of commitment is essential to quality maintenance and
continuous improvement for any size enterprise.

Available Resource(s) Key Quality Control Points Description

Industrial Sewing Machine(s)
(KQCPs)
• Machine Maintenance Machine and Resource
• Selection of correct settings Maintenance is key to quality
management in a sewing
process. A sewing enterprise
with limited resources shall focus
on the maintenance of the
available machine resource and
setting it correct for each job.

Cutters • Accuracy based on Cutters as resources in a sewing

measurement process have a potential of
saving material if adequately
• Balance in saving of fabric and used. Cut-men should cut-tosize
quality cuts and also not compromise on
quality cuts with an aim to save
fabric. Quality and accurate cuts
should be simultaneous.

Fabric /Cloth • Correct reading and The inspection and reading of

assessment of fabric prints and, quality shall be done by the
designs. buyer while making purchase
inspection at the suppliers’ site.
The fabric design influences the
quality look of a garment.
Facility • Adequate protective storage Safekeeping of fabric in non-
damp conditions protects it and
other resources from damage
that can compromise quality.
 Labour skill Inspection and application of job Labour should use formal and
knowledge tacit knowledge in managing a
process of sewing as well as the
associated resources.

Defects Library

Sewing defects

 Open seams

 Wrong stitching techniques used

 Usage of different color threads on the garment

 Miss out of stitches in between

 Creasing of the garment

 Erroneous thread tension

 Raw edges
Color defects

 Difference of the color of final produced

garment to the sample shown

 Accessories used are

of wrong color combination

 Mismatching of dye amongst

the pieces.

Sizing defects

 Wrong gradation of sizes

 Difference in measurement of
a garment part from other

Garment defects

 Faulty zippers

 Irregular hemming

 Loose buttons

 Raw edges

 Improper button holes

 Uneven parts

 Inappropriate trimming

 Difference in fabric colors.

Steps in garment inspection

 Raw material inspection in garments industry

 In process inspection in garment industry

 Final inspection in garment industry

Raw material inspection in garment industry

Fabric
Inspection

4-Points 10 Points
system system

4 Point System
10 Point System

Warp Defects Weft Defects

Size of Penalty Size of Penalty

defects point defects
point

Up to 1 inch 1 Up to 1 1
inch

1 to 5 3 1 to 5 3
inches inches

5 to 10 5 5 inches to 5
inches half the
width

10 to 36 10 Half to 10
inches Full width
Fabric Inspection Details
In Process Inspection

 Spreading inspection or Spreading defects

 Pattern and marker making inspection defects

 Cutting inspection or cutting defects

 Sewing inspection or sewing defects

 Finishing inspection or finishing defects

Spreading Inspection Details

Cutting Room Inspection Report

During Sewing Quality Control]

Fusing Check Report

Daily End Line Inspection Report

At the end of In Process Inspection

Measuring quality performance in defective %

Recovery Inspection

Check whether remedial works satisfactory.

Check on volume of work successfully recovered.

Avoidance of work recycling.

Final Inspection

Final inspection consists of inspecting finished garments from the buyer’s point of view; size
measurements, form fitting (putting garments on the proper size manikins to see if they
properly fit labelled sizes); and live modelling if necessary (again to see if the garments
properly fit the labelled sizes).

 Total Acceptable Product (TAP) & Acceptable Quality Limit (AQL)

 Example
10,000 dozen T-Shirts have AQL of 4%. Then find out TAP of that lot.
Here,
100 dozens T-Shirts have acceptable limit = 4 dozens
1 dozen T-Shirts has acceptable limit = 4/100 dozen

10,000 dozens T-Shirts have acceptable limit = (4/100) X 10,000 dozens = 400
dozens

TAP = (10,000 - 400) dozens

= 9600 dozens

Generally in garment industries, inspections are made 1%, 1.5%, 2.5%, 4%, 6.5%,
10%, etc. This depends on the buyer’s requirements

Finishing

In garments industry finishing is a process which consists of pressing or ironing, folding and
packing of garments. Among them, by pressing we remove unwanted crease or wrinkles from
garments. Again folding is done by ironing. After pressing, the process used to fold the
garment in a required size and shape is called folding.

Type of Packaging

 Stand up pack

 Semi-stand up pack

 Flat pack

 Hanger pack
  Colour fastness to agreed agencies: (e.g. washing, rubbing, perspiration, lights) -
checked and on-going continuity cards generated, showing rating, checked against
specification.

 Stability:

Shrinkage, and extension recovery where needed - to be within tolerance of

specification

 Endurance:

Abrasion, pilling or snagging - tested where needed. Rating checked against

specification

 Flammability: Performance rating in appropriate test checked against specification.

Sample Inspection Details

AQL Audit Form- Sewing

Date: Audited By : Style:

Garment First "A" Defects "B" Defects "C" Defects

N° Impression
(Client
 Appeal) CRITICAL MAJOR MINOR

1= Serious defect Defect that might be Minor defect

Excellent leading to customer noticed customer probably not noticed
2 = Good complaint and/or complaint probable by customer but not
Style 3= return according to
Size Average specification
Fabric 4 = Bad
Description Qty. Description Qty. Description Qty.
5=
Unsellable

Total "A" Defects "B" Defects "C" Defects

DHUs (Defects per Hundred Units) = {(A defects x 1) + (B defects x 0.5)} / No. of garments inspected x100 =

Comments:

( * ) Number of garments inspected

Post Sewing Quality Control- Daily Finishing Final Checker Report
Style: Date:

Inspected By:

9:00- 10:00- 11:00- 12:00- 1:00- 2:45- 3:45- 4:45-

Description 10:00 11:00 12:00 1:00 2:30 3:30 4:30 5:30 Overtime Total Remarks

Pcs
Checked/Cumm

Pcs
Passed/Cumm

Sewing Defects

Broken Stitch

Skip Stitch

Open Seam

Uneven Margin

Loose Stitch

Puckering

Raw Edges

Bartack/BH

Insecured

Missing

Position Wrong

BTN

Insecured

Missing

Position Wrong

Fabric Defects

Stains

Holes

Shade variation
Weaving

Other

No. of defects
(a)

Total Pieces
Checked (b)

Total Passed

[Total no. of defects (a) X

DHU = 100 ] / Total checked (b)

Quality Finishing In
Manager charge

Finishing Inspection Details

Visual Inspection ( Visual, Construction & Packaging)

Packaging Inspection

Post Production Quality Control

Final Inspection Details

Date: Department:

Buyer:

Order no: Order Date :

Lot size : Inspection Sample size :

Work Order No : Delivery Date:

Style no. :

10 12 14 16

FEATURE FEATURE S M L XL
DEFECT

Mark with √ (tick) and M – major defect or m = minor defect

FABRIC & DEFECTS

GENERAL Holes / tears

APPEARANCE Dyeing defect

Shading

Soil / oil stains

Pressing defects

Creasing

Thread ends

Others
Customer Specific Inspection Report
 10 12 14 16

ACCESSORIES FEATURE DEFECT S M L XL

Mark with √ (tick) and M – major defect or m = minor defect

Correct count

BUTTON / SNAP

Correct type

Correct position

Secure

Tidy at back

BUTTONHOLES

Correct size

Correct thread colour

ZIPPER

Correct colour

Correct type

Slides smoothly

Correct position

BELT

Correct size

BELT LOOPS
 Correct length

Correct width

Correct position

No raw edges

Overview