Cotton Caught in a Global Price War →
I have contacts in the cotton and t-shirt industries left over from my Busted Tees days. One of my guys wrote to say:
We are being told by our suppliers that there may be some disruption in supply and delivery of t-shirts this Spring and early Summer.
There is specifically a worldwide shortage of 30 singles cotton yarn - which is the yarn that American Apparel uses to make the shirts we are buying.
In addition to the basic shortage of cotton world wide - there are production interuptions from Gildan - with 25,000 factory workers basically disappearing in the Earthquake in Haiti - which translated into a shortage of production for basic cotton tees in the Americas of about 1 million units per week since the earthquake.
We are being told that things should be back to somewhat normal by next Fall - but that the next 90 days could be bumpy regarding sourcing shirts.
I wonder if American Apparel will pivot to diversify their product line away from cotton-based goods in order to balance their margins.
