The cost of making a jacket

What is the cost of making a jacket?

 

We get asked this a lot! So lets talk about our bestselling Grey Cocoon Scuba Jacket. This soft casual jacket is made in the main of Neoprene, in more familiar terms Scuba fabric. This is a synthetic rubberised fabric you may have come across in the form of laptop sleeves, orthopaedic braces, or indeed in scuba diving suits. In most cases this material is fairly rigid and strong, however as we are making jackets, we want this to be airy, lofty and soft to the touch. So we have fused two types of scuba weave together, with the front of it being more of an open weave, allowing for less rigidity and more suppleness. The internal scuba is white and tighter to hold the structure of the jacket together. We have added a soft, jersey inner lining to the jacket to keep the jacket soft to the touch inside and out.

The cost of this jacket lies in the 3 different types of fabrics that have been used, that have been especially woven for us, but also in the make of the garment. The jacket is first cut into patterns and then skilfully sewn together by specialists in jersey construction. We are passionate about working with factories that pay a good living wage to their workers and provide them with good working conditions. We work with great factories in Turkey, who have years of expertise in the manufacturing industry, and take pride in their workmanship. These factories also produce for larger clients, and with us being a small business, we get additional costs in the form of surcharges for smaller quantities produced. This is understandable as the factory floor manager is freeing up space to produce a smaller run of technical garments, rather than a larger run of repeat orders, which ultimately would generate more units and more income for them.

The final piece of what goes into the cost of this jacket is importing it into the UK….. (ahhh how we miss UK production). We transport our products by truck, so by road, and typically this takes 2-3 weeks to arrive into the UK.

So, in summary, what costs go into the making of this jacket?

• Higher quality of fabrics
• Specialist construction
• Ethical practices
• Transportation

We have taken great care to choose fabrics and construction that wash and wear really well, so you can just use the washing machine at 30 degrees and re-wear superbly.

You can of course find other scuba jackets online and in some retail shops. These jackets tend to be heavier in fabric weight and more rigid, so less flexible, and less lofty. They also tend to be either sporty in design or more formal; like a hoodie or a coat. If you like to have a jacket that is an easy ‘throw on’ or similar to a cardigan, this Cocoon Scuba Jacket is right for you.

As a small business, we take pride in producing ‘slow fashion’, fashion that is not dictated by fast trends, or cheaper qualities. We think of fashion in slower terms, and more of an investment that you can wear again and again!