Go Offshore

Reprinted with permission from Stitches Magazine, Feb 2009 – Written by Steven Freeman

Back in the late ’80s to mid-’90s, embroidery digitizing was enjoying its heyday in the United States. Digitizers, or punchers as they affectionately called one another, charged as much as $30 per 1,000 stitches to program a design. Vector art was still in its infancy and the limited number of artists trained in the software were also able to charge a premium for their time and talent.

Then, as the millennium wound down, a new player emerged on the stage – and everything changed. Enter the Internet. The power of the Web and the ability to transfer electronic files with virtually the speed of light caused a paradigm shift in the embroidery and digitizing industries, allowing offshore providers to participate aggressively in the U.S. market.

While there are still numerous domestic outlets to obtain art and digitizing services, outsourcing these products can be a viable and profitable option if done carefully. As an apparel decorator, you should be prepared to source and qualify your vendor based on a set of criteria. It’s your responsibility to determine the importance of quality, price and service. You should understand that dealing with offshore vendors may force you to deal with significant time zone issues. You should also be prepared to take the time to understand and appreciate the cultural diversity between U.S. and offshore business practices. Here are five specifics to consider.

Quality is number-one concern
“Our biggest concern with using an offshore digitizer or vector artist is quality” says Bill Stockwell, owner of Added Touch Embroidery and Screen Printing. “We can’t afford to compromise our quality to save a few dollars.”

Stockwell has valid concerns. But there are steps you can take to protect yourself when using an offshore provider. “Provide feedback to your outsourcing agent,” says Joanna Grant, one of the cofounders of Affinity Express, a graphic design and digitizing house with offices in India and the Philippines. “A good outsourcing agent will act on your recommendations. Consider the comments carefully, though. A statement such as, “Your quality needs improvement,’ doesn’t provide enough information about what’s wrong with the quality.”

Amit Jham, owner of DigitizingMart.com based in Mumbai, India, agrees with Grant. He keeps a log of every customer suggestion and annotates a customer file to build a list of “properties” for each customer based on their requirements. He urges customers to give specific suggestions and examples of areas where improvement is needed or excellence has been achieved. “That way, we can build a record of how to please a customer on every single job,” he says.

While it’s your vendor’s job to provide you with a quality product and service, it’s your responsibility to provide your vendor with enough information to do the job right the first time. “Complete information is important,” Grant says. “Our customers frequently neglect to provide enough information to allow our team to produce work exactly as they require.”

For embroidery digitizing, you should include at a minimum:
• the fabric the logo will be embroidered on
• the finished size of the design
• if the logo will be on hats or flats
• the file format you need your design in
• what elements are to be included or excluded from a design

For vector art, you should include at a minimum:
• the substrate for printing
• if you’ll require color separations
• the file format you need your design in
• what elements are to be included or excluded from a design
• Hint: Make sure all are fonts converted to curves.

Know what services should cost
Currently, prices are all over the board. However, you can find embroidery digitizing for as little as $1.50 per 1,000 stitches or flat-rate pricing such as $25 for any crest design regardless of stitch count. “Many customers jump around from vendor to vendor,” Grant says. “It makes better sense to choose one vendor – the one with the most experience, good pricing, best reliability and the most complete service. Make your vendor a partner.”

Vector art services are similar. You can find quality work for as little as $10 a design. With this type of pricing you might be tempted to experiment with a new “low-price leader.” However, based on Grant’s advice, supported by Jham, you’re most likely better served by establishing a relationship with a vendor who understands your needs and can react based on your order history and profile of order properties.

Navigate time zones and cultural diversity
While it might seem obvious, you should be aware that the operations of companies such as DigitzingMart.com and Affinity Express can be as much as 12 ½ hours ahead of where you’re located. While larger companies such as the two mentioned have U.S.-based customer support zones, many of the smaller companies don’t. Because of this, be aware that today is tomorrow to these vendors – and you need to adjust your production schedule accordingly to accommodate this reality.

Additionally, many times you’ll find a language barrier to be an issue. You should also expect that common clichés and the subtle nuances of American English may not be understood by your vendor. Avoid using slang when providing instruction.

A point to consider: In North America, we often encourage our employees to take initiative and make decisions when all of the information isn’t present or there’s room left for interpretation. In some countries, employees are discouraged from making these types of decisions. Because of this, your instructions may be taken quite literally. And while something may be quite obvious to you, the operator doing the work will not deviate from a set of instructions and make an executive decision. Because of this possibility, you should always eliminate as much need for interpretation as possible.

Make sure there’s access to customer service and support
You’d be well served to find a company that offers U.S.-based telephone, live chat and e-mail support. The support staff will be able to speak to you in the lingo you understand and pass the instructions off to the production departments in the lingo they understand. Additionally, U.S.-based support will more closely match the operating hours of your business.

Look before you leap offshore
All of us are aware that working with offshore vendors has positives and negatives. Aside from all else there is the political hot potato of outsourcing work that, in theory, can be done on our shores. But as the world changes and economies are more closely mingled, the fiscal reality may force some of us to look hard at outsourcing at least part of our art requirements.

Some of these companies have suffered some black eyes because at first their quality was suspect. However, over the past few years the stronger organizations have realized that shoddy work at any price will not be accepted, so they have adapted. The result of this is there are offshore art houses doing very good work for extremely competitive prices. But it’s up to you to nurture the relationship and provide your vendor with the information and resources necessary to provide you with the quality product and service you demand.