Shirt-maker urged to end China deal
BRITISH shirt-maker Charles Tyrwhitt is scaling back manufacturing in China after customers said they no longer wanted to buy products from the country.
Founder Nick Wheeler told The Mail on Sunday: ‘We are reacting to what the customer wants.
‘A lot of customers are telling us they don’t want us to make shirts in China. They don’t like the Chinese government.’
As well as reducing the number of garments made in China, the company is ending its contracts with cotton suppliers in Xinjiang province from July. Mr Wheeler also cited wider human rights issues for the move, saying: ‘There are areas of Chinese manufacturing using forced labour – but it’s so far removed from anything we would ever do.’
Charles Tyrwhitt is just one of dozens of major multinationals scaling back manufacturing in China due to such concerns, coupled with steep tariffs on Chinese goods imported to the US.
A study by Swiss bank UBS last year found three in four US firms with factories in China are either moving or considering moving their operations to other countries, such as Vietnam. They include Nike, which is reviewing its supply chain in Xinjiang, and Apple, which could shift almost a third of its iPhone production out of China.
Relations between China and Australia are also deteriorating. Beijing has slapped tariffs on barley and wine and is disrupting imports of many other Australian goods.
Charles Tyrwhitt makes all of its shirts overseas – it has factories in Vietnam, India, Malaysia, Italy,
Portugal and Eastern Europe. In the UK, the company makes shoes in Northampton, ties in Essex and suit fabric in Yorkshire.
Mr Wheeler said customers have asked him to make shirts in the UK, but he said higher manufacturing costs would mean he would have to more than quadruple prices, charging about £140 a shirt.
‘We try to make as much as we can in the UK,’ he added. ‘But UK manufacturing sadly is not what it used to be.’