GHCL’s strengths revolve around its penchant for innovation and consistent product development with the aim of creating a clear differentiation from competition, strong passion for sustainability and the circular economy, thought leadership in creating intellectual property and its ability to partner with multiple agencies to realise our four-pillar strategy.
Mr. Manu Kapur, President and CEO – Home Textiles, GHCL says, “At GHCL, all that we do consistently revolves around our 4 Pillar Strategy – Sustainability, Traceability, Innovation and Giving Back to Society. This truly is our competitive edge and is something that customers look at us for. We’re extremely passionate about Sustainability and the Circular Economy and strive to work with fibers that have a low environmental impact, employing processes and solutions that are sustainable and focus on ‘reduction, reuse and recycling”’.
GHCL has been continuing to work on strengthening its marketing, product development and operating teams in the home textile segment. The strategic focus of the company continues to revolve around sustainability, traceability, innovation and giving back to society. These areas are clearly becoming the company’s competitive advantage, and are likely to see a huge improvement in the proliferation of business across geographies, with better margins, in times to come. The company has today launched a few brands in the home textile segment including REKOOP, Cirkularity, Meditasi and REKOOP 2.0
Innovation
GHCL has taken a very clear leadership position on innovation and sustainability across global home furnishing manufacturers. REKOOP, GHCL’s sustainable bedding concept that is made by blending cotton with recycled polyester from post consumer PET bottles, was launched in March 2018. The fact that REKOOP is the only solution where the recycled polyester is forensically tagged thru the CertainT platform of Applied DNA Sciences in New York, thereby securing provenance and complete traceability across the supply chain, makes it totally unique. REKOOP is probably the first truly circular bedding concept, where having lived their lives, these sheets can be depolyemerized, with the cotton becoming a biofuel and the recycled polyester being rendered raw material for remanufacture.
Mr. Kapur said, “We wanted to do more than just provide paper trail certification and supply chain traceability of sustainable and special fibers to our customers. This is what spurred us to look at the fascinating arena of DNA tagging, the epitome of securing authenticity. Our partnership with Applied DNA Sciences for the forensic tagging of recycled polyester paved the way for the uniqueness of REKOOP, by establishing its provenance and traceability across the supply chain. Our traceability strategy has helped us in providing our customers the framework to stand behind the claims they make in a foolproof manner.
GHCL also launched a brand called CIRKULARITY, with 8 different bedding collections that support the circular economy and focus on ‘reduce, reuse and recycle’. In March 2019, the company launched a health and wellness bedding brand called MEDITASI, which has 9 ranges that include radiation control, temperature regulation, moisture management, athletic recovery and skin rejuvenation.
More recently in September 2019, REKOOP 2.0 was launched – an evolved and expanded expression of its earlier avatar – with rPET being blended with several different sustainable fibers, with several different weaves & finishes, with performance integration and with a wider spread across the price pyramid.
Sustainability
Mr. Manu Kapur says, “Sustainability is a way of life for us and is not viewed as a mere competitive advantage or as something that is either fashionable or essential to include in our scheme of things. We are truly passionate about sustainability and are constantly and consienctiously working towards reducing our impact on the environment and ensuring that our workers are adequately taken care of.
“We are consistently working with low impact fibers – ‘more sustainable cotton’ – BCI, Organic or Cotton Leads, recycled polyester, cellulosic fibers like Lenzing AG’s TENCEL™ and REFIBRA™ and also fibers like Modal, Linen, Hemp, Cupro and Kapok. Our intent is to move to the usage of over 50% ‘more sustainable cotton’ and 100% recycled polyester by 2021”, he added.
GHCL has invested heavily in renewable energy, with 40% of its energy requirement for spinning coming from wind energy. The company’s investments in solar energy are ramping up quickly too. Over a quarter of HCL’s total water in processing is reused as is 100% of the caustic used for mercerization. The company makes paver blocks of fly ash and limestone fines to mend and build roads within the factory, reuse waste metal for making trolleys, step ladders and seperators. All conventional lighting has been replaced with LED lights and with indigenously made units that use the scientific principles of refraction to bring daylight into our shopfloors and warehouses.
Manufacturing
GHCL has integrated textile manufacturing facilities centring around Spinning on one hand with 1, 92, 000 lakh spindles and 3320 rotors and Home Textiles (Weaving, Processing and Cut & Sew of Bed Textiles) on the other. The company’s state-of-the art Home Textiles facility in Vapi, Gujarat comprises of 190 Air Jet looms, 45 million meter of wide width processing capacity, 12 million meter of weaving capacity and 30 million meter of cut & sew. “We are exploring avenues of capacity expansion that would support the extension of our product basket and you will see some interesting additions to our offering in 2020”, Mr. Kapur added.
Future growth
2019 has been a good year for GHCL. The company has been able to consciously course correct, become more relevant and solidify its positioning. GHCL has continued to be meaningful partners to a host of retailers, importers and brands overseas and have added some prominent customers in its fold. The company has expanded its US operations and hired an Executive Vice President in New York to expand business in the region
In his concluding remarks, Mr. Kapur said, “In my opinion, Sustainability will be the key factor that drives the future growth of Home Textiles globally. There is an increasing awareness of the damage that the Textiles industry inflicts on the planet, being the second most polluting industry globally and being responsible for the utilisation of huge levels of non renewable resources. At the same time there is an increased demand for products that are made using sustainable raw materials, production processes and supply chains. GHCL is well set to embrace this key factor whole heartedly, given the passion that we have for preserving the planet and its people”.