| Aldine Printing |
New York City |
This is a first class, very expensive printer who can do business cards, Lookbooks, mailers and they even did hang tags for me Their work is far superior to most of the average-priced printers in NY, but you get what you pay for. Being an art director, I'm very picky about color, and they were able to match things better than a number of other places. |
10/19/16 |
Lisa Selwitz |
| Clinton Park |
san francisco |
offers pattern making, markers, grading, consultations. Steven Heard is owner. Makes most of his money providing these services to clients but owns his own custom-made denim company. he is generally nice but can be quite frustrating to work with. ive been working with him for over a year. in that time, he's made mistakes on my patterns and markers twice, and both times charged me for the work anyway. i made several samples based on his incorrect markers, about $850 in samples, which was infuriating. he doesn't take responsibility, nor apologizes, and there is always a subtle hint that its the clients fault. In both cases, I had email evidence of the changes to be made, and that he did not follow the written list, but he makes excuses. He is not reliable time-wise and is not organized. He makes it very clear if he likes/dislikes you. He has been in fashion for over 20 yeras, an ex-Levi's employee, so has a lot of experience and when he is focused does great work. but all of these other characteristics unfortuately makes it not worthwhile to work with him. he is not cheap. |
2/28/17 |
olga lemberg |
| Clothier Design Source |
St. Paul, MN |
Sourcing manager quit, completely disorganized and unprofessional staff, etc. |
4/26/2016 |
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| Clothier Design Source |
St. Paul, MN |
I am using CDS for my sports bra. I am in prototyping and really not using every piece of their service for development. They charge for every single thing. I sent them 5 elastic samples I sourced this week. I told them "give me three that you want me to order to test and I will order them." They cahrges me $100 to evaluate the email about the elastics! I understand once I've ordered them and they want to evaluate them they can charge me. Now this is Time I spent sourcing! It's stuff like this that I find very annoying. So I have my own product developer and I discussing most everything and have them simply doing design review and sewing. |
4/26/2016 |
Tahra Makinson-Sanders |
| Clothier Design Source |
St. Paul, MN |
I first hired CDS to fabric source for me. I sent them super detailed specs of what I needed and even a ton of swatches I sourced myself to give them references for what worked or didn't work. Months later, I get a packet of fabrics, 90% of which fall outside of the specs I specified so clearly (too heavy or light, no stretch when i needed stretch, etc.). I complained & they defended themselves by saying that I did such a good job sourcing myself that they didn't have much to offer! Then why the heck did they let me pay them $350 for something they couldn't help me with!? And of course this was such an absurd excuse given they are a huge company offering fabric sourcing and I am a start up designer! How could it be that I did a better job sourcing than they did? I soon understood that the sourcing manager didn't know what she was doing and/or she wasn't trying hard to help me find what I needed. Soon after that, the sourcing manager quit (?got fired) suddenly. Still not having found even ONE fabric that works for me, the new sourcing manager comes on and tells me, "sorry, your project should have been managed differently based on the type of fabric you were asking for (custom vs. stock). so if you want us to find something else, you need to pay more." ahh! I immediately left. Regardless, hopefully you will be happy with their sewing - its certainly reasonable to think they might be better for certain tasks |
4/26/2016 |
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| Clothing Labels 4u.com |
Florida |
This company makes digital and woven labels. They're on the pricier side, and I'm currently embroiled in a dispute over the quality of their production. They made digitally-printed satin labels for me and they were twisted. They wouldn't lay flat. They made them over again, and they were even worse. Now they're denying there's even a problem in the first place. Very difficult company to work with. Would definitely avoid them in the future. |
10/19/16 |
Lisa Selwitz |
| DPS/Design Pattern Sample |
Atlanta, GA |
This is a case of attempted price gouging. I received a quote from Geffry Tate to produce my handbags. He wanted to base his quote on what I paid for a prior production run rather than what he could actually do the work for. I had a conversation with Mr. Tate prior to receiving a quote. During that conversation, I told him I wanted to reduce production cost and work with someone locally. He offered to send me a quote within 24 hours after I send him pictures of my handbags and the cost of the previous production run for each item. His logic was he wanted to base his quote off of my budget. I told him what I paid was high and was not my budget. I again told him I wanted to reduce cost. He sent me the quote after a couple of email exchanges. What he quoted me was exactly $.64 cheaper per item than what I had paid before. I told him no thanks. I received another email from him trying to argue that his quoted price was cheaper than what I paid before. I reminded him that his quote was only $.64 cheaper per item and told him his quote should not have anything to do with what I paid before. That was the end of our exchange. |
12/23/16 |
Angie Beavers |
| DPS/Design Pattern Sample |
Atlanta, GA |
UPDATE: I received another email from Mr. Tate trying to convince me to give him another opportunity. My answer was no...too many red flags. He didn't know the difference between a messenger bag and a satchel nor did he seem knowledgeable about fabric. Also, the quote was based off of what I paid previously. His follow-up email was very nasty after I told him I was no longer interested in doing business with him. He accused me of not having money for production, not being satisfied with anything he offered, not being a serious inquiry, and being uncooperative. In the meantime, I researched this company on the web and found out DPS is an affiliate of Community Reach Inc. It also operates under the business names of Elizabeth M. Design and PDS. The address shown on Maker's Row points to a non-existent building on the GPS. I am unable to find anything on the company listed as a reference on DPS' Maker's Row profile page. This company has a C- rating with the BBB with 2 complaints. Mr. Tate is actually mentioned by name in one of the complaints. There is also a complaint on Thumbtack. The major complaints include, charging for unauthorized work, failure to honor contract terms and poor quality of work. I have not found a business license for DPS yet so.... After finding all of this information, I responded to Mr. Tate one last time. My actual response, "Yes, let's blame the person who said no to being overcharged. I am serious about my inquiry, but not interested in being taken for a ride. As far as red flags, I will be happy to point you to the BBB complaints and the complaint about Elizabeth M. Design concerning not honoring contracts. As far as resources to move forward, you don't know what's in my pocket. The only thing you do know about it is that you will not be able to get your hands on it. BTW, I am sorry you are offended by me expecting a fair quote and quality work when paying for a service. Are we done?" I have not heard back from Geffry Tate nor do I want to. |
12/24/16 |
Angie Beavers |
| Gotham Textile/Softlines Manufacturing |
MN |
First off, Gotham Textile "rebranded" to Softlines Manufacturing, so I was unable to track down references for the new name -- that should already tell you something. Original account rep promised me patterns, a BOM, and digital die files and they will now no longer provide me with any of these deliverables, despite paying them almost $2k. |
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| Gotham Textile/Softlines Manufacturing |
MN |
I had 2 separate negative experiences. One was just simply lack of communication, broken promises on timing, and no respone after leaving numerous voice mail and phone calls. Second time around, a year later, same experience. Spent 3 weeks just waiting on initial contact after they recieved my design notes and sample via UPS. |
2/1/17 |
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| Jeanette of South San Francicso |
San Francisco |
meeting her on Friday May 5. She quoted $35/hr to sew samples. She comes highly recommended. I'll let you all know. |
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Tahra Makinson-Sanders |
| Jennifer Loel Designs |
Cotati, CA |
She and her team are always delayed in their work, their work is not high quality and she charges a fortune! In my opinion Jennifer Loel just takes on more and more clients, meanwhile she & her team can't handle the work she brings in and so the results are always a disaster. I also lost a lot of money with her. |
4/26/2016 |
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| Jennifer Loel Designs |
Cotati, CA |
I had an horrible experience with Jennifer Loel as well, lost a lot of money on unusable samples. I lost nearly 15K with her... |
4/26/2016 |
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| JLD Studio |
Portland, OR |
Small operation run by 1 woman. I sent them my prototypes to evaluate and give me a 1st quote. The proces seemed very good based on 100 units. Samples of a knit dress with no more than 8 - 10 panels was between $100-150 each. I asked them to sew production samlpes for me. They used their laser cutter which they are new to. The fabric cutter was out the day they worked on my project. The owner admitted they misused the laser cutter by allowing the fabric to feed in from the floor rather than from the roller, meaning the fabric was not cut in a relaxed state. Causing the dresses all to be 2 inches too short. They didn't tell me this I had to discover it and wait for them to evaluate it after they said the tech pack didn't' have a spec sheet. I spent money paying my prod developer to create the spec sheet in painful detail. Then I flew there to do a face to face. They admitted what they did but said since your patterns need another round of adjusting anyway we'll credit 4 hours of pattern work to make up for the errors in fabric cutting. Now, my own pattern maker is $60/hr. They wanted to charge $90/hr for pattern adjustments. Then I asked for new quote since they have now sewn the styles. One style went up 2x in price because i added a pocket and two invisible zippers. So, now trying to get a quote from another factory. Each dress at a 100 units was between $27 - $36 to sew. |
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Tahra Makinson-Sanders |
| Kathy McCabe |
Los Angeles, CA |
Horrible communication. Constantly having to check in and call/email. Chose not to work with her based solely on how bad her communication skills were. |
7/2016 |
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| LaLaLand Production |
Los Angeles, CA |
Started out fantastic. Gorgeous factory with very impressive clientele list. We decided to work with them, so shipped them everything for our production order. Cost us several thousands dollars. Several weeks later, they informed us that they didn't have time to take on our project. We wasted months with this factory. When they shipped our goods back to us, it was missing a box of our custom zippers, cost of $2,000. The package was signed for by their employee but we were told that it wasn't there and they wouldn't reimburse us. A month later, the box arrived on our doorstep (clearly it was in their factory the whole time). We had already reordered the zippers, so we were out another 2K. |
10/2016 |
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| Lefty Production |
Los Angeles |
I worked with Lefty Production on my latest batch of towels - they even packaged them for me. The quality was fantastic and Marta and her team were super responsive. My one problem with them is that they said that the fabric manufacturers didn't send enough trim. The shop was super messy as they were changing up their setup and, while I obviously can't be certain or prove it, when I did the math it sounded like they misplaced an entire box. It bothered me that they didn't even entertain it as a possibility and shifted the blame immediately to my fabric guys. Meanwhile my fabric guys were kind enough to split the cost of a new shipment of fringe - that's the customer service I want. At the end of the day I brushed it off as this experience was far smoother than my first sew shop and I think you just have to expect stuff like this to happen. I will say though that I know someone else who worked with Lefty and they had an entire box of completed product go missing once it was supposedly in UPS hands and they ended up losing quite a bit of money and weren't happy with the customer service response either. So.. if you do work with them - I'd say pay attention to the details and ask for documentation on materials received and get insurance on your shipping |
2/28/17 |
Tiffany Shown |
| Lefty Production |
Los Angeles |
spoke with Marta and and she was responsive and professional, just didn't have a ton of experience in handbags. |
2/28/17 |
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| Lefty Production |
Los Angeles |
I have been in contact with Marta + Megan at Lefty -- they are super nice and responsive. I ended up not going with them because their prices weren't inline with what I was searching for, but I did get a good first impression |
2/28/17 |
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| MadeRight |
San Mateo, CA |
super sweet guys but I did not love their work. Their guy that did tech packs was not good (I had to pay another person to fix their tech pack which they charged me $500 if I remember correctly). They only do production abroad and have minimums of I think 100 pieces per style and color. At the time I was working with them they did not provide a service for having samples sewn so you had to go and get your samples done somewhere else and then bring it to them. Finally things just kind of took a long time. For example, each tech pack revision seemed to take forever... it was frustrating |
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| Melko, NY |
New York City |
I worked with Cindy Mak on a jacket and skirt design. I was very new to it then. She graded them, I wasn't so happy with the grading job, I mean, it was accurate, but I didn't like the grade rules and didn't know enough to check/insist on certain things. The sewing was beautiful...really nice. She seems very competent. Her minimums can be low (25, I actually only had enough fabric for one that was 13, and she did it). Tiny place, if you want your work on view by anyone who visits, that happens there (I didn't love that, but that's the industry sometimes). A couple things weren't right, I had her hem scarves, and those were very late and done with the wrong threads...but the tailored (more difficult by far) pieces were beautifully done. |
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Annina King |
| National Apparel |
San Francisco |
They are well known here. They can do almost anything. knits / Wovens. I had them sew three knit dresses for prototypes. I think becauseI am new they didn't give my product much care. They sewed even though they knew their machines were needing repair caising the bindings and seams to be wobbly. Each dress was about $100 - $140. They don't give price breaks until you hit 500 units. They will do smaller units. I haven't asked them to give me production proces yet. They are fast. Going back to them to get production quotes for 100 units. Will report back here, |
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Tahra Makinson-Sanders |
| National Apparel |
San Francisco |
Have been working towards production with Johnny and team for almost 9 months. Overall they are relatively responsive and nice. But here's my experience:starts with the owner Johnny quoting me a price for production a few months ago based on fully sewn samples and tech packs. I had it in writing via email Then, after I've had all my fabric and materials shipped to his factory, and as I'm gearing up to start production, he changes his mind and demands an increase in the price/unit by almost 25%. Says this new price will ensure his team does a really "good job." Offers no other explanation. I barter a bit, we agree on a new (but still more than the original) price. I have him make me 6 samples (cost $900). His team didn't follow my tech pack (stitching is wrong in several places). He doesn't apologize and tells me its my fault for not pointing out all the details on the tech pack (we had an hour meeting going over everything prior). Despite pointing out the issues, he nonetheless requires full payment for the samples, which I begrudgingly hand over. Now, ready to discuss the contract and the TOP samples, he says he will charge me sampling costs for the TOP samples. I push back gently stating that its my understanding that its an industry standard to provide TOP samples for QC (I confirmed this with several other production facilities that thats true). And so he writes back, "we're not the right shop for you. come pick up your things." |
2/26/17 |
olga lemberg |
| Source Easy |
San Francisco |
After a ton of terminations on the product development team, delegating tasks to the wrong people, and just plain chaos, not only did they simply just not complete the work I paid them to do (source fabrics/trims, complete tech pack, sew me up a sample, etc.) but they managed to LOSE 4 of my sewn samples (4 shirts, 4 pants) I provided as references to them as well as patterns and fabric swatches. Turns out my package was stolen in plain daylight from their offices because it was not adequately supervised (and other clients' packages were also stolen; they think it might be somebody who works for them!). After a huge ordeal and on the verge of threatening legal action, they finally agreed to refund me the development costs and the costs of my lost samples. But I lost a very valuable TWO months in the meantime. I learned that when I provide anything of value to a contractor, I should always indicate the value of that property upon transfer, document what I am leaving with them, and have the recipient sign a NDA. |
4/26/2016 |
olga lemberg |
| Source Easy |
San Francisco |
They fired their entire SF product development team, switched account managers to NY, nobody knew what the heck was going on. |
4/26/2016 |
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| Spooltown |
Portland, OR |
Spent almost a year working with the ladies at Spooltown -- while friendly and responsive, I was not happy with the quality of work (at one point, they used a seatbelt, an actual seatbelt as a strap on a sample) and the slow response time. They also tried to push me to make design choices I did not specify in my original sketches, and kept reminding me how "lucky" I was to work with them. Would not recommend. |
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| Spooltown |
Portland, OR |
They are constantly busy and booked for months in advance. I tried for over a year to work with them. |
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| The Apparel Sourcing Agency |
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I also have a designer friend who is being held hostage by The Apparel Sourcing Agency. I never want to bad mouth people but enough is enough!! These people know that they can take advantage of emerging brands because they bank on us not knowing what we don't know. |
4/26/2016 |
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| The D.N.A. Group |
San Francisco |
I worked with Dan and Alex for over a year to develop my first collection of eco-luxe loungewear. This was my 3rd attempt at trying to find a production facility that would work with me to develop 11 pieces with customizable options and no minimums. The line is demi-couture. Having said that, I realize that most facilities would not even take on my project. Ideally, I was trying to find a local team that I could work with on a per piece basis but was unable to find any one in the Sarasota, Florida area or near where I live. Dan is the operations manager, while Alex is the lead designer. I found out later that they have 3 businesses - including a lingerie line and Alex's own line, in addition to the production facility. I mention this because I believe this is the major issue contributing to my complaints against them - numerous false promises, missed deadlines, and production errors - even when all changes were submitted in writing by myself continually. My complaints were always received with a very polite and immediate response with no resolution, apology, or accountability on their end - there was always another excuse - essentially, blaming me. In the end, I stopped all communication because I was continually lied to and promised the "moon" especially during new phases when they needed more $$ (they require 100% upfront and so you have no recourse for missed deadlines) - It took over 1 year to recieve all of my items - some pieces were never 'right'. These guys are very nice and I think that's why I stayed with them so long - but I feel like their priority is their own lines (including Alex's recent appearance on project runway) and that the production clients like myself are bascially financing their interests rather than being a priority. Ultimately, I "charged-back" a payment due to a missed deadline and severed the relationship. I will never work with a factory again that is so far from me geographically, there is simply no way to oversee production. Lesson learned. Hopefully this will help someone else! |
10/24/16 |
Karen Roth |
| V Mora |
Chicago, IL |
Only when I threatened a lawsuit did I get action but still lost time and money. |
4/26/2016 |
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| V Mora |
Chicago, IL |
Same problem with VMora. Lost a lot of time an money with them with none of the materials I paid for. Very little of the sourcing I paid for did they give to me. They switched account managers on me so many time and moved my project from a Chicago group to a NY group. |
4/26/2016 |
Tahra Makinson-Sanders |
| V Mora |
San Francisco |
I didn't deal with them personally but heard from friend designers that their samples were unusable. |
5/5/2016 |
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| U.S Embroidery |
Wilsonville, OR |
The bulk of their business is athletic football and basketball jersyes, but they do fashion knits and wovens too. I"ve been really happy with their work and found the owner, Kirk, to be responsive and HONEST!. They have two cutting tables, 12 sewers and embroidery machines. Patterns must be digital and ready for production. |
4/14/17 |
Michele Thomson |
| Maderight |
San Mateo / Asia |
Seems they are focusing mostly on woven. They give a contracted delivery date. If they miss the date they give you a % back. First time working together they expect 6 months. After that they expect reruns in about 30 days. They are pushing thier white label line and working off those designs. 14 day sampling gaurunteed. There is a dedicated account rep for your project/ They say they reduced lead time by 50% by allowing customer to see online where in the process the project is, time stamps and notes. Main office is in San Mateo. Sample factory is in Shanghai and owned by Maderight. They carry a lot of fabric in stock. Some of the recent production issues they have had is customers being able to meet fabric minimums. They can do sublimation but has higher minimums. They provide printing services. Plastisol heatpress for active apparel (synthicatical) Heat pressing logos. Minimums are 300 units for production. 14 pieces for sampling. |
06/21/2017 |
Tahra Makinson-Sanders |
| ClutchMade |
NYC |
I've now worked with CluthMade for the product development of our initial collection and one production. I can't say many good things about them. The first few prototypes were done super fast, and while they were expensive (average $1000 each), we were happy to have found someone who could work this fast. The relationship went downhill fast. They missed our first production date alltogether, which they chose the date based on our photoshoot. No apologies (this continued through our relationship). So we were missing pieces for our shoot, which was a huge expense. Orders were constantly late, and quality control not great. Only after our first produciton run did the owner Laura inform us that they would charge us a "monthly storage fee" to hold our very small amount of fabric and hardware! We paid almost $300 a month. Then, when I went to place a reorder a few months later, she informed me that her pricing went up 40% and her minimums doubled. We were stuck completely at this point not being able to afford the new minimums so we found a bew factory and asked her to ship our metal dies to us. She charged us $490 to package them. Not to ship them, just to PACKAGE them. There were only 4 styles. My new factory received the dies, with several parts missing and big clunks missing out of them. I emailed Laura and asked about the missing pieces and she replied that she was shipping them. No apologies no offer to ship on her dime. Needless to say, i DO NOT recommend anyone work with this factory! |
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| Kloth |
Vancouver, Canada |
ve been working with Kloth for a couple years now and I have to say they are WONDERFUL. Their work is impeccable, timely, and the owners, Garry and Michelle, are honest and straightforward - no BS type people. They are a bit on the expensive side, but they also have no minimums and will work with literally any size order you have. I have gotten production runs as small as 18 pieces from them and they don't bat an eye. They don't push my work to the side in order to satisfy larger clients either, which I know is very often an issue for startups with small minimums. I started working with Kloth because they were the only low-minimum factory near me in Vancouver, but since learning so much more about the industry I realize how lucky I've been! They are now located on Vancouver Island, about 45 minutes from where I live, and Garry has even come into my town to pick up fabric/notions from me so that I didn't have to ship it or drive it up to them! So helpful and friendly! They have even been patient with me while I sorted out funding, even though I know they are extremely busy. |
11/14/17 |
Kaitlin Martin |
| U.S. Embroidery |
Oregon |
A factory that I work with would like me to share their information to all you awesome designers. The factory is U.S Embroidery in Wilsonville, OR. They have about 12 sewers and also have a full run of embroidery machines (obviously, hence their name). They sew knits and woven. The've sewn a simple long sleeve t-shirt for me and now are sewing a woven slip dress. I've found the owner, Kirk, to be professional, knowledgeable and fair and honest!. You will see from their website that the majority of their work they do is football jerseys and sports team uniforms, but I've been very happy with their work and Kirk is open to working with small designer companies like us. No minimums. The slip dress cost me $30, but I am only making about 20 of them in production. |
12/28/2017 |
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| Suuchi |
NJ |
Discussion in FB group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1837844186441304/permalink/2394822980743419/ |
1/27/18 |
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| krysmanufacturing.com |
Philadelphia, PA |
To start, this website is essentially false advertising. Kristin ( the owner) claims to have a skilled team, she doesn't it's her and a few non skilled workers and interns. It also claims " she will make certain your product is EXACTLY the way you want it " this is not even remotely true. I first met with her at the end of January, I explained that I wanted to start with 2 gowns that were bodice/skirt combos so 4 pieces total. One of them would be a remake of my wedding dress, which I left there as a reference. and the other would be a remake of a gown that was mostly completed but needed some changes based on what the fabric was telling me etc. I agreed that I would make the changes to the pattern myself and bring it in the future. In that meeting I told her that these patterns were a bit tricky, that I was looking for someone who had experience with formal wear and the fabrics that were used in it namely silks, organza, dress bones, slippery lining fabrics, invisible zippers etc. I said that I understood that many companies specialize in things like uniforms, street wear, athletic gear etc and that if she didn't think they were set up for my project I totally understood and I didn't mind if she wanted to talk to her people and get back to me afterward. I gave her the opportunity in that moment to choose whether or not my project was a good fit for herself and her team's skills. She told me no problem, that we should just walk through the patterns when I came back and then it should be fine. We met again the next week, I brought the aforementioned wedding dress, that I made by myself, and the incomplete sample bodice and skirt which were complete enough to provide an adequate reference for anyone saying that they are qualified for such a project. I also brought the relevant patterns, some invisible zippers and interfacing. We went through the order of operations for the bodices which were the complicated part, I physically showed her how all the pieces folded and fit together, I let her take notes on the patterns and add additional info as she saw fit, I listened to her input, answered her questions and asked her if she needed anything else from me. She said that now that we had done that it seemed pretty straight forward and doable and she had the examples as well as photographs I had given her as references so she would be fine. We agreed on the price and the standard 50% deposit and that she would do the preliminary samples before the final fabric samples which I agreed was standard, I asked if she needed materials for that and said that I would be happy to provide muslin or any appropriate fabric that was similar to the silk in the bodice. She said they had what they needed and they would probably start on it the following week. I said I was going back to NYC mid Feb ,( about 2 weeks from then )to have a few meetings and to source fabric and that I would let her know what I had when I came back. It seemed pretty standard for companies to make full muslin samples of each agreed upon garment, in my case 2 outfits totaling 4 pieces. According to everyone I've talked to initial muslins are meant to include all facings, finishings, linings, trims, closures and the agreed upon type of hem. This is what I was expecting to have by the time I had my real fabric. I gave her the time to walk her sewer through the patterns like she said she would, and to start making these proper samples while I focused on my upcoming trip and getting fabric. When I came back with my fabric I emailed her what I had and asked if the samples were finished. She showed me one photo of a sloppily put together bodice front in a dark, textured fabric that wasn't the right weight. I said it was hard to see the detail in that fabric and it didn't seem folded properly or lined and that it was on the right track but not there. She provided no other pics of the other bodice or 2 skirts. She had said she'd keep working on it. I waited to hear back about the progress or any questions. About 2 weeks passed, I assumed that since there were no more questions she was just working away at it and I emailed to check in. She said she thought I was sending the fabric to her even though I never said I would do that , I said let me know when you're done and ready for the real fabric. She also said that because she thought I was sending it she had stopped working on the project instead of continuing to develop full samples like a professional would do. I said I would drive up to check in and bring fabric ( one hour each way if there's no construction or traffic ) When I arrived we went over everything again, she again said it would be straight forward, not to worry and that she didn't make the skirts because she thought they would be easy. She said they would start working on it again in the next few days, They didn't. Then I start getting the barrage of emails with photos because now she has tons of questions because she wanted to take a short cut and not work out the patterns in muslin like a professional. Some of her questions she wanted to blame on the patterns being bad, they aren't I used them to make my wedding dress by myself just fine and they were professionally made by a woman who was a pattern maker for Nike who used the latest pattern making software. I answered all of her questions she said she understood but it started to become obvious that she wasn't following the directions I had discussed or written and that she wasn't following the sketches I left which included each swatch for each piece along with the list of additional notions that each piece required. The next time she emailed me it was obvious that not only had they not been working as much as they said that because she wasn't following my instructions she was in fact, cutting out pattern pieces in the wrong fabrics i.e. one gown was white, one was light pink, she was cutting out a large pattern piece clearly meant for the white dress out of the pink fabric and then telling me I didn't have enough pink fabric. I ordered more and had it sent there and the problems continued with her sending me pictures showing how sloppy her work was. I was seriously stressed at this point, and I knew that I had done a much better job and that I could do a much better job so I decided she was destroying my project and I needed to fire her and go get it. So I did. She had plopped everything on a table on the lower level of the building so she could just buzz me in without helping me or discussing anything. I grabbed everything and went home. Once I started looking through everything it became obvious how horribly unprofessional she was. I had brought all of my patterns either hung on hooks or neatly folded in their envelopes. I would say there were 50 pieces total. When I brought them home none of them were hung up and every single pattern piece, even the ones in the envelopes were completely wrinkled. I had to iron every single piece and the wrinkles will never come out completely so I will have to pay to re print them. She had partially remade the pink skirt with the wrong pattern, the bottom of the skirt was uneven, the seams were puckering and she didn't even bother to face it. The other skirt was partially cut out and each piece had jagged edges because she clearly did not know how to cut silk and didn't give a shit. The white bodice was partially assembled and smashed. The pink bodice was a nightmare. The inner corset was slopped together, the fusible interfacing wasn't fused, the boning which comes on a roll, wasn't ironed first so it was buckling and the front pieces were thrown together. NOT A SINGLE PIECE FOLLOWED THE 1/2" SEAM ALLOWANCE ! It went from 1/8- 3/4" like the person had never used a sewing machine before and they just shoved it through ! This is silk that I now cannot reuse. On top of all of that,she kept the leftover 2 types of dress boning, lining, used that wrong zippers and every single item smells like she sprayed it with perfume. I can't use any of what was returned and now have to buy more silk because of her and start over. It was clear that she didn't care at all about my expensive fabric or my business. She took a project she was absolutely not qualified for, tried to make excuses about it, destroyed it and never apologized. She has no business in this business and I wouldn't trust her to make a simple cotton pillow case let alone a garment. I literally could have done a better job drunk ! |
1/18-4/18 |
Michelle Fite |
| AnabelleNYC -Manufactuer |
New York (Brooklyn area) |
Worse exprience ever! Anabelle NYC, does not ever meet deadlines, She lies a lot. Tell you one thing and its another. Good at sewing and pricing. Thats it. If you want your line to launch on time DO NOT GO TO HER. You would be better off going to a manufactuer who has morality and understand start up money does not grow on trees. I am in the processs of taking away and adding to my collection. Due to ANABELLE NYC , lost about 6000.00 dollars because the season I wanted to launch for has came and went. My Lesson is to do research |
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| Rainbow Leather |
New York (College Point) |
http://www.rainbowleather.com/
Rainbow Leather does full-color printing, foil stamping, cutting, perforating, and embossing of leather. I have so far only used them for full color printing, but I can highly recommend them for this. I talked to and tested out many other leather printers before I chose Rainbow. They are responsive, fast, and reasonably priced. They answered all of my emails within 24 hours, and they turned around my orders within the quoted time frame (2 weeks). The one issue I had was that I had leather hides delivered to them and signed for by their front desk, but they weren't aware they'd received them. So, if you send them hides from an outside source, be sure to get the tracking code and follow up with Rainbow as soon as you know your package has been delivered. When I followed up they were all over it. They'd found my package by the next morning, and all was right back on track. They're also great about sending free samples of their work so you can see it for yourself before you commit. A+ |
8/1/18 |
Laura Shape |
| Funari Fashion Consulting |
New York (Brooklyn ) |
http://www.funarifashionconsulting.com Janelle Funari and her business partner Danny Levine run this company. They are expensive and have no system for communication whatsoever. Sometimes texting and sometimes calling and rarely emailing the messages are confusing and unitelligible. They SHARE an email address so you don't even know who is writing to you! A design meeting is $975.00 and their retainers are $2500.00 and they go through them quickly. After asking many questions I was told, "perhaps you shouldn't be in fashion." I was reminded daily about "how they have launched over 50 successful brands" and that "they could do this shit in their sleep". Hubris does not make for good business. I had to get really mean and legally agressive to get them to WORK FOR ME. I ultimately had to fire them. My lawyer (who said they are notorious for being unprofessional and money grubbers) has had to intervene to get my second retainer back...or what's left of it. There are many other choices for product development in NYC, do not use them. Feel free to reach out to me if you want more detail. |
1/14/19 |
David Mucci |
| Thread Tech, Inc |
Boston, MA |
After designing my first full line of clothes I was excited to work locally with a new manufacturing company that advertised that they could take designers from idea to production, completing all the necessary steps along the way under one roof. Initially I was impressed with the attention to detail that the owner, Donielle Martorano McKeever, displayed while showing me the work done on some other pieces. I value quality workmanship so was thankful to find someone who did as well.
I picked up two completed styles in early July and found that none of the sewn pieces looked like I expected. The simplest example being that striped pants didn't have the strips lined up at the seam and patterned skirts did not have the pattern centered. Two aspects that should be basic quality requirements. I brought everything back the next day to show Donielle and was told they would take a look and make sure to correct everything. She asked me to email details of everything that was wrong with pieces which I did. One week later I was sent an email stating "she had discussed the matter with her attorney and he would take it from here." I was dumbfounded.
3 months later and the situation is still not resolved. Thread Tech has all of my patterns, samples, designs, fabric, etc., and money. I have done a lot of research into this company, its founder and backers. What I've learned is that Thread Tech is at least the fourth manufacturing business Donielle has started and two have been taken bankrupt along with designers property. Their pricing structure while advertised to save a designer money and time, is actually way over standards and a la carte. For example, Tech packs are $300 and not complete or detailed so useless. |
10/8/19 |
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| The D.N.A. Group |
San Francisco, CA |
The short version is that they are unreliable, unprofessional and are not accountable. Worked with them for two years. During that time I received poorly made samples with many errors. The patterns were full errors as well and some were completely missing pieces or had the wrong pieces. I tried to get the patterns fixed by a third party but there are so many errors that I have to get them completely redone at this point. Now, I have nothing and I am in the process of having my pattern completely remade.
Below are details if you have time to read through.
1. Sample Making Process:
a. Overall poorly made samples were produced.
b. No Quality Control. Samples were clearly rushed to be made for the fitting and no one reviewed them before the fitting.
c. Errors - Didn’t offer to fix their errors for free
i. Backwards collars on two samples
ii. Buckled lining
iii. One side of the jacket longer by 2”
iv. Bad samples overall which made it hard for me to determine if the fit was right and/or if I can move forward with finalizing my samples.
2. Suppose to be experts that you can rely on:
a. Didn’t even mention that I should have interfacing in my jackets until I asked about it later on.
b. They feed on your lack of knowledge.
c. Since you already paid them, they didn’t have your best interest and I just felt like the root cause of the sample issues never really got addressed.
3. Not accountable for your timeline at all.
a. Slow process and doesn’t respect your deadlines.
b. They will tell you a date that something will be completed by but they don’t give you any updates but miss your deadline.
4. Not professional.
a. Won’t pick up your phone calls or return your emails for several days.
b. People will go on vacation but you have no idea because you don’t receive an OOO reply letting you know they will be out or they don’t give you heads up about it.
c. Moving across the country without notifying their clients.
d. Logo, label, or hang tag development - I didn't receive any service on these items and paid others to complete.
5. Patterns included many issues:
a. They didn’t give me the specs at the time of the fittings so you weren’t really able to keep track of things that needed to be updated.
b. I was told that I would get my final graded patterns on July 5th but didn’t get until August 2nd. I was told that they needed the extra time for quality control review of the patterns.
c. I could clearly see there was no quality control review of the patterns. Just on one style alone I found the following errors.
i. Collar from the pattern was completely different from the sample. I had to have it remade to match the sample by another pattern maker.
ii. No back facing included in the pattern.
iii. No lapel facing patterns included.
iv. Several pattern piece indicating to cut “1”when the sample clearly showed that there “2”.
v. Missing patterns for the lining.
vi. There are so many errors that it is better for me to have them completely redone by someon else.
6. Material and sample fabric:
a. All my materials and samples were shipped to the east coast without my knowledge. We were coming to the end of my contract and I could have picked up my samples and fabrics avoided incurring shipping fees.
b. DNA Group lost 5 yards of lining that I have been tracking on my end since they were purchased in March 2019. Even though I know that it was not used in any samples they insisted that it was. Furthermore, I was told by them that they are not a storage facility and are not responsible for lost items. |
11/11/2019 |
Lori Reposa |