The traditional garment industry is accelerating the pace of automation and intelligent transformation, and Luo Xiaoquan’s factory has also become a wave of transformation.
The cut fabrics are sent to the hanging rail system above the workers’ heads. They are like riding a roller coaster, constantly flowing in the air to the next process. After several moves, one piece Brand new clothes are released. On this hanging rail, the clothes on the front and back are different.
This is a scene in a garment factory under the management of Luo Xiaoquan as the factory director. This factory with more than 500 people has previously been engaged in OEM production behind large brands. Under the changes in the digitalization of the manufacturing industry, the factory is also working hard to adapt to the C2M (customer-direct production) model and promote personalized customization. Different information is designed, distributed, and finally accurately connected together, and finally manufactured into completely different products.
This is also a microcosm of the transformation from automation to digitalization in the garment industry. Similar changes have taken root and sprouted in all aspects and corners of the garment industry.
1 A job that used to require multiple interviews
This year is Luo Xiaoquan’s 29th year in the garment industry, starting from a “ From working as a wage earner to now being the helmsman of the factory, he has witnessed the transformation of this industry from being so popular among employees to “the boss is offering a high salary of 10,000 yuan and waiting in line for the workers to choose.”
The time goes back to 1993. Luo Xiaoquan, a 20-year-old boy from Jiangxi. Two years of experience as a tailor apprentice in his hometown allowed him to master the craft of clothing making. He turned south and came to Guangdong. Dongguan. Like many young people, Luo Xiaoquan is looking forward to finding a factory job here.
With this skill, he thought he had a chance to win a job in a garment factory. Unexpectedly, I encountered a “wall” on the first day of job hunting. The factory required a test to enter. The test equipment was a tram, which was very different from the sewing machine I learned at home. “It was quite difficult to get into a factory at that time. People were asked to look for jobs in factories everywhere, unlike now where factories are looking for people everywhere. First you have to interview, and after the interview you have to do the actual operation, and make clothes on site according to the interviewer’s requirements.”
Luo Xiaoquan also spent money to learn how to ride a tram, and finally successfully entered a small factory that produces jeans. With his skillful and excellent garment-making technology, Luo Xiaoquan became the production manager of a large clothing company in Guangdong in 2000.
The factory helmed by Luo Xiaoquan has previously been engaged in OEM production behind large brands.
The garment industry is a labor-intensive industry, and how to reduce labor costs has always been one of the key issues that manufacturers consider. He was deeply impressed by the 2008 financial crisis, when foreign trade orders decreased. In order to reduce labor costs, some foreign-funded enterprises have relocated to inland or Southeast Asia.
Luo Xiaoquan did not follow the trend, but persevered and worked his way up from front-line lathe, workshop leader, department supervisor, department manager, factory director and deputy general manager of the company. In order to quickly transform himself from a technical role to a managerial role, he used his free time at work to learn computer operation and management related knowledge.
2 Starting from the hanging system
Industry 4.0 is becoming more and more popular and is changing subtly. The production process of various manufacturing industries.
The traditional garment industry is accelerating the pace of automation and intelligent transformation, and Luo Xiaoquan’s factory has also become a wave of transformation.
Faced with the old ideology and the traditional manual way of making clothes, Luo Xiaoquan, the “new factory director” who took office, also encountered difficulties. “The family management model is too serious. There is no system, no process, no system, poor execution, and low factory efficiency.”
On one end is the urgent need for automation and intelligent transformation of the garment industry, and on the other is the deep-rooted traditional production model of garment factories. Promoting change is an urgent issue for Luo Xiaoquan.
With many years of management experience in large clothing companies, Luo Xiaoquan believes that the innovation of the old management model should be given top priority. “Only by changing the general manager’s thinking first and formulating new internal management System, innovate software-level tools, and hardware upgrades will naturally come naturally.”
Different from the original pursuit of low cost, Luo Xiaoquan believes that it is difficult for enterprises to develop in the long term if they have no awareness of quality and only pursue low cost for immediate profits. So he began to persuade the general manager to pay attention to the quality of clothing and build a new management system. Under the delegation of authority from his boss, Luo Xiaoquan took the lead in establishing a quality department, rebuilt the production management system, and improved the employee management system.
“Not every company that introduces advanced systems or intelligent equipment will have immediate results. There are many examples of companies that are greedy for more and seek speed and fail.” Luo Xiaoquan insisted, making The intelligent transformation of garment factories cannot be based on blind pursuit of speed.
The first step in transformation is the introduction of a garment hanging management system. The hanging management system allows each piece of clothing to be circulated according to the garment production node, which means that the lathes at the node must be online, otherwise stuck points will occur. Based on the standardized management of employees, the cooperation of front-line lathes and hanging systems allows the entire garment-making process to flow efficiently and orderly.
In the traditional production model of the garment industry, after the garment pieces are cut and turned into finished products, various workstations need to be continuously processed.This is still the direction the factory is targeting. Participating in various large-scale clothing equipment exhibitions every year is a must for Luo Xiaoquan’s management team, learning from excellent experience and applying it to their own factories.
He understands that no matter how advanced the equipment is, it still needs people to operate it. In addition to introducing new equipment, how to attract and retain people is also an urgent issue that needs to be considered in the transformation and development of the garment manufacturing industry.
In the “Ranking of the 100 Occupations with the Most Labour-Shortage” released by the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security in 2020, the manufacturing industry is the most labor intensive. Some experts predict that the overall shortage of manufacturing workers in my country may reach 30 million in 2025. “In the past, job seekers took the initiative to approach factories to ask if they wanted to recruit workers. Now, in the recruitment market, there are more recruiting companies than applicants. In the past, employees revolved around management, but now management revolves around serving employees.”
“Young people don’t want to enter the factory, and they don’t want to be restrained on the assembly line.” Faced with the problems of “difficulty finding people” and “labor shortage”, Luo Xiaoquan tries to continuously improve factory-related systems and enrich the company’s cultural activities. , allowing young employees to experience a different taste of life outside the assembly line. </p
