Coats is the world's leading industrial thread and consumer textile handicraft enterprise. Founded more than 250 years ago, the company has maintained its professional status through technological innovation and by setting industry standards. The company's technical expertise enables it to replicate sewing thread color and quality well in production facilities and dye houses around the world, providing a consistent product to a wide range of customers in the apparel and footwear industries. Coats masters colors.
challenge
Many things can affect the perception of color, including lighting conditions and the way a person sees color. Unless color is observed under properly controlled conditions, there is always a risk that the perceived color will not be accurate. Coats customers include clothing and footwear manufacturers around the world who rely on Coats to provide the exact color matching sewing thread they need for sampling and production. Through customer feedback and its own research Coats found that customers in the apparel and footwear industry found it difficult to quickly and accurately select the right color thread for their samples and receive it in a timely manner. It may take up to 5 to 10 days to deliver a sewing thread sample. If the sewing thread is not an acceptable color scheme, the entire process has to be repeated, delaying design and production. In addition, Coats data shows that more than 15% of sewing thread orders are not needed, partly because of these long lead times, this unused excess stock sits idle in warehouses, causing unnecessary waste in the supply chain.
Coats are always looking for cost-effective ways to make the most of technology in order to ensure customers can quickly and easily determine the exact color of sewing thread they need for their project, while making the most of existing stock of sewing thread. In other words, Coats wants to help customers scientifically define sewing thread color specifications, ensuring that these specifications are correct the first time and always.
solution
Coats turned to X-Rite Pantone, a global leader in color science and technology, for a solution. The result is Coats Color Express, the world's first fully digital sewing thread color matching web service, providing the apparel and footwear industry with fast delivery of samples of industrial sewing thread in precise colors. As an added bonus, Coats has also partnered with X-Rite Pantone to develop the Coats Color Stock Match. Using Coats Color Express technology, this service provides an easy and accurate way to identify and utilize existing sewing thread in stock to find the closest color to the current stock. Coats Color Express and Coats Color Inventory Matching are truly integrated sewing thread sampling and thread inventory management services, connecting brands, retailers and manufacturers with Coats' sales teams, laboratories and production facilities all online.
Based on X-Rite Pantone's CAPSURE™ Spectrophotometer , custom handhelds were created to meet the specific needs of Coats and its customers. Each device comes pre-loaded with a color library including Coats Standard Shades and Pantone Reference Guides. The device can also be pre-loaded with the customer's existing sewing thread shades and sewing thread stock quantities.
Customized Coats CAPSURE™ devices are compact and portable with great convenience for use in the office, laboratory, factory or on the go. It uses a one-click color matching system, which can accurately identify the colors existing in all materials, and match the color components with a color in Coats' huge database of more than 14,000 shades in seconds. It applies proprietary camera technology to illuminate the surface under test from three different directions while simultaneously recording 27 color-accurate images within two seconds, eliminating shadows and inherent distractions from textured surfaces. With 8 different visible light sources and 1 UV light source, the instrument can measure color more accurately than traditional Colorimeters, which usually include only three light sources: red, green, and blue. Designed for easy, accurate color measurement of difficult-to-measure surfaces such as textured walls, doors, carpets, fabrics with small patterns, and openwork fabrics whose complex textures may be invisible to other instruments.
result
Coats Color Express is an innovative service that has been implemented by 900 clients in 18 markets around the world for globally recognized retail brands. Unique in the industry, this provides customers with an easy-to-use mobile tool to help them select a sample sewing thread in the exact color match that meets their needs. More to remember: Reduce delivery times from the historical industry standard of 5 to 10 days to within 2 to 3 days. In some cases, samples can be delivered to customers in as little as 24 hours.
If the desired color is no longer available in the Coats database, the captured data can be used to create an electronic fingerprint of the color requirement, which can then be digitally transferred to the nearest Coats Color Laboratory for production.
Key program/key program statistics include:
· Reduced delivery time from up to 10 days to 24 hours, with standard service options of 2 to 3 days.
· More accurate color matching of sewing threads, resulting in less scrap and rework.
· Increased ability to utilize existing sewing thread stocks.
· Simplifies the ordering process for new custom sewing thread colors.
“This innovative service has been a huge success for clients,” said Hizmy Hassen, Group Digital Director, Coats plc. “This again places greater demands on us to compete and maintain Coats' dominance in the industry. Partnering with X-Rite Pantone and combining our respective knowledge and expertise has resulted in a pioneering solution of international caliber , not only speeds up the process of obtaining the correct color of sewing thread, but also supports the Sustainable Development Goals by helping to address the significant sewing thread waste problem in apparel and footwear manufacturing."
