In this exclusive chat, Pawan Gupta and Abhishek Sharma – co-founders of the leading manufacturing platform Fashinza – share how the company came into being, their journey over the years, their focus on sustainability and the way forward in a world crippled by the pandemic
What ignited the idea of starting the business? At the initial stage, who were the people who bought into that vision? Can you share some insights on the market you are currently present in?
In 2019, we went on a road trip to Jaipur, and we like to recount this trip as our moment of inspiration. While exploring the Pink City, our founders discovered that a huge percentage of workers involved in the apparel manufacturing industry are women. In a country where women are traditionally barred from entering the workforce, here was an industry heavily dependent on women, generating employment opportunities for them across all spheres. The desire to make a positive contribution towards such an industry inspired the founders to come up with the idea of Fashinza.
Accel Partner and Elevation Capital were the earliest investors in our venture – we received our seed funding from them. Since then, we have secured our presence in both the domestic and international markets. Fashinza has been working with leading global brands while also helping start-ups to launch their business.
What are the services offered by Fashinza? What is the problem you found and are trying to solve through your platform?
Fashinza helps brands to connect with manufacturers and produce new collections within a short turnaround time. Our unique offering is our platform. Once a brand registers with us, they gain access to a personalized dashboard where they can track the progress of their order at every stage. We provide complete visibility about production and the brands can not only track real-time production status but they can also verify the same with live images/ videos from the factory floor. We take care of the entire sourcing process for brands – from design to delivery.
A major problem within the fashion supply chain today is the lack of transparency. We are trying to solve this problem by establishing a traceable supply chain. Another common problem faced by brands is the long turnaround time. We believe our supply driven approach can offer a solution to this problem as well.
Can you highlight the important initiatives taken by Fashinza in the area of clothing and garment industry?
We are trying to promote the production of sustainable clothes and garments, either by using organic raw materials or recycled ones. To facilitate the process, we have teamed up with factories that have advanced infrastructure to produce apparels from recycled fabric. This, we believe, is a necessary initiative within the clothing industry right now. Recycling is the only way the world can continue to consume without causing pollution and wastage.
How Fashinza is bridging the gap between the fashion brands and the SMEs garment manufacturers?
A major challenge faced by SMEs is that they are not familiar with latest technologies and do not know how to leverage digitization in today’s age. As a result, most SMEs have to depend on major exporters to secure deals with brands, especially the international ones.
By offering a tech-enabled platform that directly connects SMEs to big brands, Fashinza has filled this important gap. Now, with the help of Fashinza, they can receive direct (and often repeat) orders from those brands without having to rely on anyone. Moreover, our tech-enabled platform helps SMEs to have a much more organized approach towards production. All specifications and timelines related to production are visible in one place, and manufacturers can receive real-time feedback and updates from the brands. We help them to manage everything from communication to financial transactions on a single platform, which improves efficiency.
Our platform is user-friendly and after a manufacturer is newly onboarded, our ground staff teaches them to navigate the platform through demos and training sessions.
How all can brands/ companies customise on what they are looking for through the platform?
We enable 100% customization of products. Brands can come to us with their own designs, and we can help them to produce the same. Alternatively, they can choose the designs from our catalogue and go on to customize the fabric, prints, labels, features like pockets, sleeves and so on. Basically, brands are free to pick any of our designs and improvise on them as they please.
How do the quality checks and other processes work when brands are connected to the manufacturing firms through Fashinza? How involved is Fashinza in the entire process?
Our internal quality analysis team performs quality checks at multiple stages during the production. The final inspection is either conducted by our QA team or by a third party. Our ground team is closely involved in the entire process and we ensure that the AQL set by the brands are met without fail.
Who are your partners and also tell us the names of your clients?
We recently partnered up with the UK-based Boohoo Group and we’re looking forward to new collaborations. Apart from this, our logistics partners include BlueDart, Fedex, and DHL and PwC, Acupro, and Capsave are some of our financial partners. Our well-known clients include Forever21, Hummel, Clovia, Bewakoof.com, Ajio, and Nykaa.
Tell us about your international presence as well?
Earlier this year we opened our first office in New York and we have served brands across 10+ countries over the past year and a half. Presently, our factories are located in India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and China. We’re also in the process of expanding our manufacturing base to Turkey, and Vietnam.
What are the key parameters which would drive the company’s future growth? What is your expectation post pandemic?
Our customer oriented approach and the digital intervention that we bring to the table are going to be the game changers. In a digital era when everything can be tracked and monitored, an opaque supply chain is simply outdated. We’re here to change that. We’re here to reinvent the sourcing process for brands, making it a transparent and effortless journey. We believe that these factors will propel our growth in the future.
The industry has really suffered because of the pandemic and the times are unpredictable. The manufacturing and retail sectors have suffered the most while e-commerce has surfed the waves considerably well. We’re expecting to see a large-scale shift towards e-commerce in the post-pandemic era.
What are your onboarding criteria for manufacturers?
At this moment, there are two factors that we are focusing on. The first is sustainability. We are looking for manufacturers who have a sustainable infrastructure in place, hold sustainability certifications, and can help us to establish a sustainable supply chain. Secondly, we’re looking for manufacturers who can work with low minimum order quantities (MoQ). We are working with numerous start-ups, especially in the international market, and suppliers willing to work on low MoQ projects can definitely receive a lot of business from us.