JOULES, HOBBS, REISS AND OTHER 'BRITISH' BRANDS

[sylviewylvie]

Hi everyone,
I have a quick question for people who live in the UK.

There's something that bugs me about 'British' clothing brands that flaunt their Britishness, but nearly all of their clothing care labels state that their clothing is made cheaply abroad.

This kind of saddens me personally because my family went bankrupt in the 80s due to this. They used to successfully manufacture clothing for some of these brands until they were ditched for cheap overseas manufacture. They had to make hundreds of employees redundant and they saw so many other manufacturers go bust.

I would just like to hear your opinion: would you be more likely to buy clothing from a 'Quintessentially British' brand which manufactures its clothing here in the United Kingdom if it’s just as good as your favourite brand and if it costs the same? I would really appreciate your responses about why or why not, if you have the time.


Thanks,
Sylvie :)

I would happily pay more for quality British made products, but there seems to be so little choice available. A few things from Topshop's boutique and unique collections are British made, but by no means all of it, and stuff tends to be around the £200 mark which for most isn't what you'd spend on one garment.

However I also think high street prices have been going up and up over the last decade or so, and now there is a smaller gap between more basic high street brands and mid level high street, with the divide between these and bargain/supermarket brands widening. I do wonder what the profit margins are on a £120 polyester blazer that was made in china.

In order to make enough money to bother, you need to be making a decent margin (not profit, just over and above the cost paid to the factory). The cost price paid to the factory for the top needs to cover the premises, worker, fabric, and machinery. The former two are far more expensive in the UK than in, say, Spain. Then, the company has to ship to their warehouse, quality check it, store it, package it, label it, ship to the customer. They have to pay for software to run the website, or store rents. Software to send you a confirmation email. Call centres in case DPD lose your stuff. A way of processing returns. Paypal fees, card fees. Staff, and thus HR. And of course 20% goes straight to the government.

I understand that it is regarded as a shame we don't manufacture here but the damage is done. Unless we absolutely have no other option people won't pay 60-70 quid for a cotton t-shirt made here.

I'm not saying that a Made in China blazer should cost over £100 but I do understand why a Spanish-manufactured one in natural material might.

yes - I'm surprised to see boden is making relatively small profits, I'd assumed the worsening quality was causing them to rake in the profits.

We don’t have manufacturing in this country. Scotland and the north of England have vast closed down former mills and factories. Wales lost lots of productivity. Apart from small little artisan businesses that is. We do not have the skilled machinists, Hoffman pressers, etc any more. There are still some sweat shop factories about but even these are closing. I would lay money that all the so called British brands are, in fact, manufactured in the Far East, Turkey or Romania.

TheSpottedZebra, oops sorry, I completely don't know where I got that figure from. Google says net 146 million. Not as much then.

M & Co had a small range of clothing advertised as 'Made in the UK' a year or so ago. Clothes weren't much more than items made elsewhere. I wondered if this would start a trend else but haven't seen this range in M& Co again nor elsewhere!

Quality of clothing seems worse than ever this season - been really disappointing to see paper thin, man made fabrics absolutely everywhere

Ttbb, I'm not being racist. I don't believe a particular race is superior to another.
I am just talking about it because it's obviously a subject that is meaningful to me since my family used to manufacture here. I also think manufacturing in this country would be more sustainable and better for the environment. I think that it would create jobs and a company that remains mostly UK based would contribute more to the UK, which is a good thing. I would personally want to contribute to the UK - this country welcomed my family, who were immigrants. You don't need to pull out the racism card.

I buy knitwear from Izzy Lane which is made in the UK from the wool of rescue sheep who were destined for the slaughterhouse. It's expensive and I usually buy in the sale. The quality is amazing.

I would rather buy fewer, quality items & ones that have not been made to the detriment of the workers producing them & with as light an environmental impact as possible. Easier said than done; often so hard to know which companies have good ethical practices. I am happy to buy from People Tree, generally in the sale, and get a lot of satisfaction when I find a good item in a charity shop! Bit of course I also buy from high street brands & mostly hope that if I'm paying quite a lot for them, & the company says it follows ethical practices, that it's ok... Really hard with particular types of clothing, like trainers & sports wear.

I try to support UK companies on the assumption that they at least pay their workers the living wage. I also try and support companies such as People Tree who sell clothing manufactured overseas but according to ethical standards. Yes it costs more. I was saving up this year to buy Brora but instead I've bought from Celtic &Co who also manufacture in the UK.

Last year I bought myself a Harris Tweed for my 60th - woven in Scotland and made in Yorkshire which inspired me to start checking out country clothing. I was in a shop the other week selling beautiful tweed overcoats, 100% wool and all made in the UK, They were priced around £200-£250 so not cheap but bloody good value for the quality of fabric and craft.

So yes I try but I'm no saint either and I'm as big a sucker as anyone else for a bit of Made in China fast fashion. However I find I enjoy it less and less.

I also remember when most of our clothes were made in the UK and I lived near a couple of big sewing factories that employed a lot of local people: all gone now and the jobs were never replaced. Loss of manufacturing devastated some of our towns. They haven't recovered and in my opinion, this was a big reason for the Brexit vote. M&S were one of the last to move production overseas.

The other thing I remember is having far fewer clothes and paying far more in real terms for them than I do now.

£20 for a pair of socks at Izzy Lane. Crikey! I think there is a strong market for a middle ground, higher but not silly prices, classic items that you know will last in style and quality. But to operate on a large scale it would need a very high level of investment and several years to establish itself.

I agree on Brexit Flo. Unfortunately those most affected by the disappearing industries are the same that will be most affected by leaving the single market.

Absolutely Bonbardier and I voted remain. But I still have strong links to some of those towns and there was a very strong 'fuck you' element going on and also a view that things couldn't be any worse than they already are and have been for the last 30 years. I think they're mistaken but I can see where they were coming from. It's what happens when you leave people behind like they were left behind.

And yes it would take superhuman levels of investment to get back to the level of manufacturing we had then. What I find most frustrating (and this is just my personal opinion) is that North Sea Oil could have helped to fund that investment but it's now too late.

Have you looked at Avoca? I know it's not British but only across the pond.

www.avoca.com/en/

Slightly off at a tangent, but on the lookout for some work clothes the other day I took a look in LK Bennett - I had to pick myself up off the floor when I clocked how preposterously expensive the clothes were and how cheap they looked on close inspection. Really disappointing!

Yes OP in answer to the q you asked me above about the "Britishness" being misleading.

However misleading stuff is pretty much the norm nowadays unfortunately.

I occasionally used to shop in LK Bennett. When Kate Middleton and her mother were seen in the brand the prices of the clothes and shoes the prices doubled.

Dont worry, with brexit their is the possibility that manufacturing will return to the UK at extortionate prices!

*there

I'm guessing that Flo lived near Pontefract.

The only British made high street clothes I can remember in recent years were the M&S 'Best of British' collections. I bought quite a few bits: beautiful wool fabrics and trainers made by Norman Walsh in Lancashire. I don't think that the range was a success, though, because it vanished. Presumably because people wouldn't pay the higher prices.

Other than that, I can only think of Burberry, which still weaves its fabric in Keighley and sews the macs in Castleford.

I haven't bought anything from Reiss for years, except shoes. I pick up a dress or a top and think, "you must be bloody joking. £200 for a polyester frock!". Ditto LK Bennett, although they also do the very hard sell which makes it worse.

I couldn't possibly comment, Nettle - I am an international woman of mystery

Let's just say people had waited 30 years to give the government a bloody nose.

Hotter manufacture all their shoes in the UK, yet they are one of the most derided manufacturers on here. Their prices are (to me anyway) high-ish but their stuff is excellent quality, and as a customer I like knowing the boots I wear were made in the UK and not in a sweatshop.

Butterfly I'd be surprised if Avoca clothes are made in Ireland. Bet they're made in Taiwan or India.

I think if clothes were made locally surely that would save on transportation costs. Some of these shops like LK Bennett seem so overpriced, if they're made by poor Indian women then they are having a laugh. With their inflated prices I mean. LK Bennett is nothing special.

sylvie I completely agree with you. I once had a Bowden skirt made from British made Tweed fabric with a Union Jack label inside next to the made in Romania label.

There are a few clothes still made in Britain - most of the knitwear and sheepskin at Celtic & Co, Nancy Dee - they mainly make jersey dresses in sustainable and organic fabrics; Postcard from Brighton is designed and made in UK; there is a company called Grace which mainly does patterned polyester tunics. I've also managed to buy a few completely random items from shops you wouldn't expect which were actually made in U.K.

I remember reading that Margaret Howell was trying to start up her own factory in the UK. She was talking about how the biggest problems were to do with finding people with the right skills and that it would probably mean having to set up a training academy too. I don't know if anything came of it. If someone like her, whose customers aren't normally short of a few quid, couldn't manage it then I think it shows the scale of the problem.