We all recall, the Y2K bug , which was to end the whole computing systems, crash planes, run machines amuk and abruptly shoot out missiles. Thankfully , nothing happened and we all transcended to the safe havens of year 2000.
But there was one thing , which actually changed the world since the advent of year 2000. This was, the " Arrival Of A New World"
The pace of change of technology since year 2000 is like one year growth is = 10 years of growth before year 2000. This itself was a big crash for those who refused to change their ways of life, thinking and adaption to the new world.
So, for me there are managers , who are profiled before the year 2000 and there are managers , who are profiled after the year 2000. The one who are profiled after 2000 are technology savvy, connected to the new world with all the modern technologies and are quickly putting these technologies into their work place and making the system more efficient . Each process, system, technology, machine after the year 2000 has become so much different from the ones before the year 2000.
So, the first thing, I check on any company, is the machines running in that company are made after the year 2000 or before the year 2000. If before, then it is way too antiquated. Because even after 2000, we are one decade afar and which is equal to 100 years away from the current technologies.
More is complex about the generation of managers, who now lead the organization, but were profiled to built companies on the last century. For them, most of the developments are way so fast that it is beyond their understanding.
These are the Y2K Bugged Managers.
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
leadership
The more you read about leadership, the more puzzling it is. Every Manager latently believes that he is the best leader, the team ever had. Or is He ?
Leadership has to be captured out of Politicians, State Heads, History , Sports and Science.
History is the open secret and the first source of information as to what kind of people finally became leaders. The more you dig , the more you find that most leaders were those who had a large following. And most of these of these followings was that of actually foolish, ( Better term would be Blind ) but goal driven and motivated to fall behind their leader , no matter, how much wrong or right that person may have been.
The key elements of all the leaders were.
Exceptionally Good Orator
Selling Dreams, ( which of course will never come out true)
Wielding Power with Iron Hand.
Keeping the people in a stage of Idealism. ( Idealism as per the ideas of the leader)
In Management, the situation is actually not any different. Depending upon, how well you can exercise the above four variables to your advantage, the better leader you would be in the long run.
Rest you should be able to speak tons and tons of words , which no one can understand, but sound very impressive on initiatives, economy, markets, policies, government, technology, IT etc etc.
In a world, where One Up Manship is the rule, then exception the leader has to find his position out of strength. And remind himself consistently on Darwin's Corporate Theory on " Survival of the Meanest"
If I was to design a leader, I would still count on the following variables.
1. Knowledgeable : Meaning well educated and with hands on experience.
2. Kind : Meaning shows sensitively to the needs of his team, not necessarily meaning extra incentives or bonuses or rewards , but providing the required resource for a fair growth opportunity.
3. Powerful : Covers risk adequately and takes quick action against any human, capital or plan failure.
By default, if you are leading a team without the knowledge and the resource , then the only variable, which works is the " Power " There are situations, wherein a person is advised to take up a job, where he has zero knowledge and is given low resources. In such an event "Power " is a very good tool to keep the place going.
Leaders are Borne, not Made. Give Birth to your leadership now.
The best leaders, which History remembers are still those, who have their profile cut out on Oration , Power, Idealism and Dreams. Rest is all ideology and self satisfaction. For a commercial enterprise, the value of a person is only till he is contributing to the shareholders wealth. His value to the society is when he has contributed to the uplifting of the society at large.
Leadership has to be captured out of Politicians, State Heads, History , Sports and Science.
History is the open secret and the first source of information as to what kind of people finally became leaders. The more you dig , the more you find that most leaders were those who had a large following. And most of these of these followings was that of actually foolish, ( Better term would be Blind ) but goal driven and motivated to fall behind their leader , no matter, how much wrong or right that person may have been.
The key elements of all the leaders were.
Exceptionally Good Orator
Selling Dreams, ( which of course will never come out true)
Wielding Power with Iron Hand.
Keeping the people in a stage of Idealism. ( Idealism as per the ideas of the leader)
In Management, the situation is actually not any different. Depending upon, how well you can exercise the above four variables to your advantage, the better leader you would be in the long run.
Rest you should be able to speak tons and tons of words , which no one can understand, but sound very impressive on initiatives, economy, markets, policies, government, technology, IT etc etc.
In a world, where One Up Manship is the rule, then exception the leader has to find his position out of strength. And remind himself consistently on Darwin's Corporate Theory on " Survival of the Meanest"
If I was to design a leader, I would still count on the following variables.
1. Knowledgeable : Meaning well educated and with hands on experience.
2. Kind : Meaning shows sensitively to the needs of his team, not necessarily meaning extra incentives or bonuses or rewards , but providing the required resource for a fair growth opportunity.
3. Powerful : Covers risk adequately and takes quick action against any human, capital or plan failure.
By default, if you are leading a team without the knowledge and the resource , then the only variable, which works is the " Power " There are situations, wherein a person is advised to take up a job, where he has zero knowledge and is given low resources. In such an event "Power " is a very good tool to keep the place going.
Leaders are Borne, not Made. Give Birth to your leadership now.
The best leaders, which History remembers are still those, who have their profile cut out on Oration , Power, Idealism and Dreams. Rest is all ideology and self satisfaction. For a commercial enterprise, the value of a person is only till he is contributing to the shareholders wealth. His value to the society is when he has contributed to the uplifting of the society at large.
It is somewhat strange that people from middle class rarely become leaders. Either in corporate sector or social life. Middle class continuously pushes a person towards follower ship and idealism. Rarely ever breeds Frontal Lead Players who can take risk and reap the rewards. Middle class is totally risk averse simply for the reason that they can never afford to loose the little that they have to keep up a social well being face before the Consumer world. And leadership is about loosing a ton, before rising to take over the world. The lower class has nothing more to loose and the Higher class don't care much, if some gets lost. Therefore, technically ,these are two basic classes which come out with the Best Leaders. Whether it is Obama to be cited or Lincoln or Bush.
Middle class leaders like Mr Man Mohan Singh ( PM of India ) can be best seen as Line Man in Leadership. If only Lalu Yadav was made the PM against him, he would have still taken many drastic decisions, whether good or bad. But Mr Man Mohan Singh, a professor of economics himself and in the highest position of the country, yet could not dismantle the bureaucracy and corruption. Simply because Middle class is not just risk averse, but within its own heart a very coward species . And leadership demands Leading From The Front with Valor and Strength.
Hence, first step to leadership is to Break Off from the Middle Class Thinking.
Empathy - A Trap
Human Resource Understanding is by far the most complex senstivity, which a Manager needs to develop. The more adept he is in mapping the conduct and capability of a person and maximizes his output to the benefit of the organization, the more successful team he builds.
One of the biggest traps,which we all fall into is the " Empathy " . The social, moral and political values of ours continously drag us to point towards being sensitive to the issues of a person. Sometimes these issues are realistic , but most of the times, these are only the economic and social weaknesses, which the manager tries to cover with his flexible oversight of work quality , expenses or behavior .
I recall , all my executives over inflated their travel expense statements. I still signed it and allowed the little extras to be taken by them, though I knew, it was an unfair reward. However, since the salaries of these executives was quite low, I would still ignore the inflated expenses. In the long run, the executives started disproportionately charging the expenses and it became a virus difficult to control. Second, having tasted blood, most of these exeutives later were finding it difficult to manage with the real situation. This was the cost of " Empathy "
But Empathy is most complicated with the Labour Force. Every single day, all of us try to give a little more to our workers. More out of sensitivity to his condition and less on account of his productivity and behavior. But the same worker, then stands up against us and fights that the little extra, which we gave as our generosity is now his right and infact, he actually deserves to get the same as the MD of the company. Here Empathy is the biggest Trap. Even the smallest gesture of goodwill extended to a worker can then become a major cause of conflict.
Somedays back, I was watching a movie on HBO. I dont really recall the name. Wherein a US Millionaire lady steps out to the Latin America to see the sufferring of the people outside US. Within the first month of watching and listening stories of rape, crime, drugs, cheating, corruption she is a pshyic case. But the most interesting line in the movie was. " Poverty is less of a curse to a person who was experiencing it, but more of a curse to those who see it around them "
In my own personal experience, my biggest waterloo in my management style was my spirtualism. What I considered as my spirtual duty to service people around me of higher order then maximizing the profit of the share holders. Later turned out that the very same set of people considered me a weak manager and started exploiting the generosities that I was extending to these low performing executives. Finally, ofcourse all of them paid a heavy price for their misdeamenour.
The reason, I am sharing this is to keep all the readers enriched with this experience, that " Empathy" is a Trap and do not allow it to overtake your professional decisions, no matter, how compelling the situation.
Do not try to be a social reformer or play Godfather in Business. Motivation of a team does not need empathy. It needs success as the driver of any job.
One of the biggest traps,which we all fall into is the " Empathy " . The social, moral and political values of ours continously drag us to point towards being sensitive to the issues of a person. Sometimes these issues are realistic , but most of the times, these are only the economic and social weaknesses, which the manager tries to cover with his flexible oversight of work quality , expenses or behavior .
I recall , all my executives over inflated their travel expense statements. I still signed it and allowed the little extras to be taken by them, though I knew, it was an unfair reward. However, since the salaries of these executives was quite low, I would still ignore the inflated expenses. In the long run, the executives started disproportionately charging the expenses and it became a virus difficult to control. Second, having tasted blood, most of these exeutives later were finding it difficult to manage with the real situation. This was the cost of " Empathy "
But Empathy is most complicated with the Labour Force. Every single day, all of us try to give a little more to our workers. More out of sensitivity to his condition and less on account of his productivity and behavior. But the same worker, then stands up against us and fights that the little extra, which we gave as our generosity is now his right and infact, he actually deserves to get the same as the MD of the company. Here Empathy is the biggest Trap. Even the smallest gesture of goodwill extended to a worker can then become a major cause of conflict.
Somedays back, I was watching a movie on HBO. I dont really recall the name. Wherein a US Millionaire lady steps out to the Latin America to see the sufferring of the people outside US. Within the first month of watching and listening stories of rape, crime, drugs, cheating, corruption she is a pshyic case. But the most interesting line in the movie was. " Poverty is less of a curse to a person who was experiencing it, but more of a curse to those who see it around them "
In my own personal experience, my biggest waterloo in my management style was my spirtualism. What I considered as my spirtual duty to service people around me of higher order then maximizing the profit of the share holders. Later turned out that the very same set of people considered me a weak manager and started exploiting the generosities that I was extending to these low performing executives. Finally, ofcourse all of them paid a heavy price for their misdeamenour.
The reason, I am sharing this is to keep all the readers enriched with this experience, that " Empathy" is a Trap and do not allow it to overtake your professional decisions, no matter, how compelling the situation.
Do not try to be a social reformer or play Godfather in Business. Motivation of a team does not need empathy. It needs success as the driver of any job.
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
SuperCritical Carbon Dioxide Dyeing - TRUE GREEN DYEING
DryDye has revolutinized the " Dyeing " Technology. For the first time in the last many centuries, here is one company, which was not even distantly related to textiles has come out with a Technology which will change the shape of Dyeing Industry forever.
DryDye would mean, no pretreatment , no posttreatment, no drying, no marks, no crease issue, no other hanky panky. At best, it might still need Stenter. However, we hope the maker of this machine also finds a solution to heat set the fabric within the dyeing equipment using microwave technology.
DryDye would use no water, no chemicals, no auxilaries and dyes mixed with carbon dioxide will penetrate the polyester chains or cellulose yarns. After completing the dyes would get extracted automatically as carbondioxide would be turned to gas again.
This means no effluent discharge, no headaches of keeping the Eco System in balance.
This new technology will change the spinning business altogather. Most spinning mills, who have so far been churning out griege yarns will automaticlly go in for dyed yarns as value added solution. The mills dont invest into yarn dyeing , more on account of large infrastructre of steam, effluent, large vessels, small lots etc etc.
Best value would be actually found by the Sewing Thread companies.
Nevertheless, Good Bye Dyeing Machine Makers . Many of my post, I have already written that most machine makers do not invest in technology at all. This is one such case, where a Non Textile Equipment Maker has come and challanged the conventional technology. CO2 Dyeing was well known to the Industry for the last two decades, but none of the dyeing machine maker invested into it and now a Dutch Company has taken the lead.
It is now upto this Dutch company to quickly make a Market Plan and take advantage of its pioneering status. Sell the system as Technology and not an equipment. Otherwise, it will see that as all other machine makers, the Copy cats have been too fast in copying and there is very little left for the Innovaters.
It is about time that they start beating their Drums and position a Global Marketing Organization to captialize on this opportunity.
Interestingly, if you check online on the patents, there are hundreds of very nice tecnologies, which can actually be commercialized by the machine makers. But since they live in their own entrapped world, they dont see Technology and Design as the key Growth engines of the current century.
DryDye would mean, no pretreatment , no posttreatment, no drying, no marks, no crease issue, no other hanky panky. At best, it might still need Stenter. However, we hope the maker of this machine also finds a solution to heat set the fabric within the dyeing equipment using microwave technology.
DryDye would use no water, no chemicals, no auxilaries and dyes mixed with carbon dioxide will penetrate the polyester chains or cellulose yarns. After completing the dyes would get extracted automatically as carbondioxide would be turned to gas again.
This means no effluent discharge, no headaches of keeping the Eco System in balance.
This new technology will change the spinning business altogather. Most spinning mills, who have so far been churning out griege yarns will automaticlly go in for dyed yarns as value added solution. The mills dont invest into yarn dyeing , more on account of large infrastructre of steam, effluent, large vessels, small lots etc etc.
Best value would be actually found by the Sewing Thread companies.
Nevertheless, Good Bye Dyeing Machine Makers . Many of my post, I have already written that most machine makers do not invest in technology at all. This is one such case, where a Non Textile Equipment Maker has come and challanged the conventional technology. CO2 Dyeing was well known to the Industry for the last two decades, but none of the dyeing machine maker invested into it and now a Dutch Company has taken the lead.
It is now upto this Dutch company to quickly make a Market Plan and take advantage of its pioneering status. Sell the system as Technology and not an equipment. Otherwise, it will see that as all other machine makers, the Copy cats have been too fast in copying and there is very little left for the Innovaters.
It is about time that they start beating their Drums and position a Global Marketing Organization to captialize on this opportunity.
Interestingly, if you check online on the patents, there are hundreds of very nice tecnologies, which can actually be commercialized by the machine makers. But since they live in their own entrapped world, they dont see Technology and Design as the key Growth engines of the current century.
Friday, September 17, 2010
Metered Packages
Last time I wrote about " Cone Size Error" and also on Sewing Threads being sold in Metres.
Textile Yarns are all sold in Kgs. Well for want of a better system of controlling the supply the weight units were adapted historically. However, now with Metered Supply packages possible, Textile Industry has still not reoriented itself to the new available Technology.
Almost everything in textiles after yarn stage takes the length unit of measurement. So, logically the supply chain has to automatically fall in line and supply the inputs as units of length.
If a fabric beam is 5000 metres each, then the supply packages have to be multiples of 1000 metres .( Considering that some beams will be of shorter lengths or longer Lengths). Yarn makers have to make exact lengths with a reserve to make the whole system efficient.
Supply packages have to have a label of say 150,000 metres packages. The user automatically then knows the number of beams available to him . The user also orders yarns as meters based on the production program.
Finally some day all yarns will be sold the sewing thread way. Cones of 150,000 metres or 120,000 metres etc .
The other ambiguity in buying yarns in kgs is the percentage of moisture or lubricant on the yarn. Normally 2 to 3% is only water, so the buyer is practically paying yarn prices for water or lubricant.
It therefore makes more sense to order as metres per yarn. However, to control exact supplies would be a big challenge.
In the meantime, atleast those who supply metered packages can always have a premium on their supplies.
Textile Yarns are all sold in Kgs. Well for want of a better system of controlling the supply the weight units were adapted historically. However, now with Metered Supply packages possible, Textile Industry has still not reoriented itself to the new available Technology.
Almost everything in textiles after yarn stage takes the length unit of measurement. So, logically the supply chain has to automatically fall in line and supply the inputs as units of length.
If a fabric beam is 5000 metres each, then the supply packages have to be multiples of 1000 metres .( Considering that some beams will be of shorter lengths or longer Lengths). Yarn makers have to make exact lengths with a reserve to make the whole system efficient.
Supply packages have to have a label of say 150,000 metres packages. The user automatically then knows the number of beams available to him . The user also orders yarns as meters based on the production program.
Finally some day all yarns will be sold the sewing thread way. Cones of 150,000 metres or 120,000 metres etc .
The other ambiguity in buying yarns in kgs is the percentage of moisture or lubricant on the yarn. Normally 2 to 3% is only water, so the buyer is practically paying yarn prices for water or lubricant.
It therefore makes more sense to order as metres per yarn. However, to control exact supplies would be a big challenge.
In the meantime, atleast those who supply metered packages can always have a premium on their supplies.
Thursday, September 16, 2010
Cotton Marketing.
Cotton is largely sold as a commodity. Pricing therefore follows the commodity rules of demand and supply.
But so is the same for any other fibre substrate like viscose , polyester, nylon etc etc.
Here is an interesting story of a Brand " Lycra " which though a man made fibre changed from commodity to a " Brand"
Lycra the DuPont brand was long perceived as Spandex and with little Textile Use never found its place in the Textile Domain. Lycra then changed its strategy and got itself related to Fashion with its appeal on stretchibility, drape etc. ( Though none of these features actually had a Fashion appeal, but then that is what is marketing ) found a good market share and is now dominant fibre in many textile applications.
Polyester makers also branded their products like Dulon, Pulon, etc etc. However, never had a marketing genius to make a brand which would not take the commodity route. The reason was the overburden of selling large volumes of production flushing out of the spinneretts and managing cash flows. If only Polyester Makers would have chosen to make Polyester with wool texture or silk texture and taken it as small percentage of the total apparel value, it would have gone the lycra way.
In case of Cotton, the story was still more interesting. Egyptian cotton was the best cotton , but failed to Brand itself as "EgCotton " and got connected to the High Value Fashion Brands, hence only got a commodity price, but with only incremental value.
Unless and Until the fibre substrates and machine makers connect there brands to the Ultimate Fashion or Home Textiles, the value of the offerings would remain subject of speculation and the best money would still only be made by the Hedge Funds.
If Oranges, Apples, Bananas could get Branded and were linked to Farms and got priced higher with their brand perceptions, then Cotton no case could have been left out.
Coca Farmers in Africa complain about the money being made by the Swiss Chocolate makers and the story for cotton farmers is no different. The yarn makers and the Fashion brands finally make the money and the farmer only hopes that the crop would get a better price then last year.
The Organic Cotton has given the best opportunity to many a farmers to come out of this vicious cycle of commodity and now is again a chance to Brand correctly and connect to the Fashion World. Cotton Marketing Organizations have to bring value to the Farmers. Commodity any high school drop out can sell.
The next important thing for cotton marketers is the Blow Room Operations. Time has come , where Farmers need to add a Blow room to their Ginning operations. A clean, uniformed, lapped and baled cotton will directly move to the Carding section of the Textile Mill. This would open up two avenues.
Higher value realization for the Farmer > Does a Apple farmer , not clean up and then nicely pack it in boxes and deliver it to the market.
Higher Value to the Spinner : The spinner gets ready to card cotton.
The best advantage of this delivery would be that now cotton can be used with thousands and thousands of Polyester spinning mills without much change. One small change and a very large market opens up for Cotton Farmers.
The 18th century cotton delivery has to now change. It is about time that the supply chain and the user , both see beyond the obvious practices.
But so is the same for any other fibre substrate like viscose , polyester, nylon etc etc.
Here is an interesting story of a Brand " Lycra " which though a man made fibre changed from commodity to a " Brand"
Lycra the DuPont brand was long perceived as Spandex and with little Textile Use never found its place in the Textile Domain. Lycra then changed its strategy and got itself related to Fashion with its appeal on stretchibility, drape etc. ( Though none of these features actually had a Fashion appeal, but then that is what is marketing ) found a good market share and is now dominant fibre in many textile applications.
Polyester makers also branded their products like Dulon, Pulon, etc etc. However, never had a marketing genius to make a brand which would not take the commodity route. The reason was the overburden of selling large volumes of production flushing out of the spinneretts and managing cash flows. If only Polyester Makers would have chosen to make Polyester with wool texture or silk texture and taken it as small percentage of the total apparel value, it would have gone the lycra way.
In case of Cotton, the story was still more interesting. Egyptian cotton was the best cotton , but failed to Brand itself as "EgCotton " and got connected to the High Value Fashion Brands, hence only got a commodity price, but with only incremental value.
Unless and Until the fibre substrates and machine makers connect there brands to the Ultimate Fashion or Home Textiles, the value of the offerings would remain subject of speculation and the best money would still only be made by the Hedge Funds.
If Oranges, Apples, Bananas could get Branded and were linked to Farms and got priced higher with their brand perceptions, then Cotton no case could have been left out.
Coca Farmers in Africa complain about the money being made by the Swiss Chocolate makers and the story for cotton farmers is no different. The yarn makers and the Fashion brands finally make the money and the farmer only hopes that the crop would get a better price then last year.
The Organic Cotton has given the best opportunity to many a farmers to come out of this vicious cycle of commodity and now is again a chance to Brand correctly and connect to the Fashion World. Cotton Marketing Organizations have to bring value to the Farmers. Commodity any high school drop out can sell.
The next important thing for cotton marketers is the Blow Room Operations. Time has come , where Farmers need to add a Blow room to their Ginning operations. A clean, uniformed, lapped and baled cotton will directly move to the Carding section of the Textile Mill. This would open up two avenues.
Higher value realization for the Farmer > Does a Apple farmer , not clean up and then nicely pack it in boxes and deliver it to the market.
Higher Value to the Spinner : The spinner gets ready to card cotton.
The best advantage of this delivery would be that now cotton can be used with thousands and thousands of Polyester spinning mills without much change. One small change and a very large market opens up for Cotton Farmers.
The 18th century cotton delivery has to now change. It is about time that the supply chain and the user , both see beyond the obvious practices.
Cone Size Error!
The delivery vehicle for the yarn is a " cone " or a " Cheese" . Interestingly the traverse of all the winding machines have been either, 6 inches, 8 inches or maximum of 10 inches. Except for sewing threads.
While the Traverse is only 6 inches, which is say around 155 mm, the cone is 170mm. The reason being the poor quality of drums and winding will take away usually another 5 mm to 10mm . In case of precision winding, this abnormality is much lower.
However, this extra 15 mm provided to the delivery vehicle is a major logistics cost. Practically meaning shipping Thin Air.
It only takes a little ingenuity to Redesign the cone or tube with maximum of 160mm length and have longer adapters on the cradle to take up such a tube or cone.
This would automatically increase the Container Loading by 6%. If a company shipping 50 containers per month @ $2000 per container freight charge. The annual savings automatically makes it $72000. Further, as the cone size shrinks, the cost of cone comes down by the same percentage . Sales Value per container goes up by 6%. Further Intelligence suggest that there is no sanctity of a 1.89 kg package. The package has to be as large as possible and preferably above 2.5kgs. Some things, since time immemorial go on without questioning . Marketing has to impress on its customers to take as large as a package as possible. This not only improves the logistics cost, but also the machine efficiency, inventory efficiency, continuity, consistency and better value for both the user and the maker.
This becomes 15% savings, when using Texturizing Tubes or Carpet yarn tubes or any 10 inches traverse cones of tubes.
It is still an Irony that none of the Textile Mills chooses to use the Pallet as the Branding Space. Pallets are still plastic wrapped. Needless to say, a company can change this to water proof paper wrapping. Plastics are violent abuse of nature.
While the Traverse is only 6 inches, which is say around 155 mm, the cone is 170mm. The reason being the poor quality of drums and winding will take away usually another 5 mm to 10mm . In case of precision winding, this abnormality is much lower.
However, this extra 15 mm provided to the delivery vehicle is a major logistics cost. Practically meaning shipping Thin Air.
It only takes a little ingenuity to Redesign the cone or tube with maximum of 160mm length and have longer adapters on the cradle to take up such a tube or cone.
This would automatically increase the Container Loading by 6%. If a company shipping 50 containers per month @ $2000 per container freight charge. The annual savings automatically makes it $72000. Further, as the cone size shrinks, the cost of cone comes down by the same percentage . Sales Value per container goes up by 6%. Further Intelligence suggest that there is no sanctity of a 1.89 kg package. The package has to be as large as possible and preferably above 2.5kgs. Some things, since time immemorial go on without questioning . Marketing has to impress on its customers to take as large as a package as possible. This not only improves the logistics cost, but also the machine efficiency, inventory efficiency, continuity, consistency and better value for both the user and the maker.
This becomes 15% savings, when using Texturizing Tubes or Carpet yarn tubes or any 10 inches traverse cones of tubes.
It is still an Irony that none of the Textile Mills chooses to use the Pallet as the Branding Space. Pallets are still plastic wrapped. Needless to say, a company can change this to water proof paper wrapping. Plastics are violent abuse of nature.
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
Polyester Pillows or Heat Exchangers.
Last weekend, I was browsing the super mall and I always track , what is new in Textiles as a material.
For long I have been watching polyester filled pillows and now there is a special mattress filled with polyester fibers. Some of these fillings are hollow fibers, some are high denier etc etc.
As a whole the gimmick of marketing has made the polyester pillows quite a success. Though for Tropical countries and Hot countries , it is a catastrophe.
I hate polyester pillows and always thought, why are the home textile companies so dumb, that they did not catch up with this new demand and quickly bought forward the Cotton filled pillows.
Combed cotton with its yellow cheesy look is just out of the world and has a handle which would be as soft like sleeping in the sky. However, no company has ever tried taking cotton fillings into mattress and pillows. Simple, because this was always the natural way of making a mattress at the first place.
Only it required was smart dressing up and branding and positioning into the market. It would have been a runaway success.
Though quilts did find a place in the branded market, however, the pillow and mattress market still remains wide open for combed cotton fillings.
In my part of the world, as a kid, I would see a hawker carrying a non descriptive large wire cotton flyer sorting the cotton and filling into a mattress. But all this got overtaken by polyurethane mattresses, which are more like heat exchangers.
Hope someday, Home Textile companies will find value in the cotton fillings again and bring regalia to sleeping paraphernalia.
For long I have been watching polyester filled pillows and now there is a special mattress filled with polyester fibers. Some of these fillings are hollow fibers, some are high denier etc etc.
As a whole the gimmick of marketing has made the polyester pillows quite a success. Though for Tropical countries and Hot countries , it is a catastrophe.
I hate polyester pillows and always thought, why are the home textile companies so dumb, that they did not catch up with this new demand and quickly bought forward the Cotton filled pillows.
Combed cotton with its yellow cheesy look is just out of the world and has a handle which would be as soft like sleeping in the sky. However, no company has ever tried taking cotton fillings into mattress and pillows. Simple, because this was always the natural way of making a mattress at the first place.
Only it required was smart dressing up and branding and positioning into the market. It would have been a runaway success.
Though quilts did find a place in the branded market, however, the pillow and mattress market still remains wide open for combed cotton fillings.
In my part of the world, as a kid, I would see a hawker carrying a non descriptive large wire cotton flyer sorting the cotton and filling into a mattress. But all this got overtaken by polyurethane mattresses, which are more like heat exchangers.
Hope someday, Home Textile companies will find value in the cotton fillings again and bring regalia to sleeping paraphernalia.
Sunday, July 25, 2010
Carbon Fibre Composites
Carbon Fibre will soon be the "In " fiber for most low weight , high strength products.
Carbon Fibre did not find any apparel applications, but was also not exploited for industrial applications. Some of the composites of carbon are now used in auto motives and airplanes, but it has still not reached a stage, where it can find a niche positioning in most industrial applications.
One of the most interesting applications of Carbon Fibre is Shoe Soles. Carbon fibers on account of low weight and high strength are wear resistance and have good abrasion resistance and the best thing being low weight.
For sports shoe applications, the carbon fibers are the best solution. A change of even 10 to 25 gms. in the shoe weight can bring about a major change in the athletes positioning in sports events, where nano seconds matter.
The shoe top fabrics also have to be researched and probably can be made out of carbon yarns.
The other application of carbon composites are heat conductive inductance cooking. Cold weather architecture application for heat preservation. Defense applications etc.
Carbon Fibre did not find any apparel applications, but was also not exploited for industrial applications. Some of the composites of carbon are now used in auto motives and airplanes, but it has still not reached a stage, where it can find a niche positioning in most industrial applications.
One of the most interesting applications of Carbon Fibre is Shoe Soles. Carbon fibers on account of low weight and high strength are wear resistance and have good abrasion resistance and the best thing being low weight.
For sports shoe applications, the carbon fibers are the best solution. A change of even 10 to 25 gms. in the shoe weight can bring about a major change in the athletes positioning in sports events, where nano seconds matter.
The shoe top fabrics also have to be researched and probably can be made out of carbon yarns.
The other application of carbon composites are heat conductive inductance cooking. Cold weather architecture application for heat preservation. Defense applications etc.
One step S and Z.
Ingenuity of technical enterprenuers always gets them the best profits and positioning in the market.
Recently I visited a factory making sewing thread. While as a factory, it is one of the most antiquated, but the most interesting thing was that the owner had practically designed each and every machine by himself. He is not a textile graduate, a raw technician and runs a very large sewing thread operation with quality only to the extent of acceptable at price point.
I will skip writing about his all other machine designs, but one of the most interesting machine that he had designed was that the S and Z twisting together in one operation.
No machine maker under the sun has been able to design such a system, but here was something unique, where 3 yarns are twisted independently on three positions as one for one and then combine on a guide and get fed into a cop which is turning anticlockwise and giving z twist with ring twister. Though the machine is still one for one twisting, yet the system is ingenuous and perfect.
The machine frame was made out of wooden board, the spindles were that of ring twisting on the z twister and the ring rail was a wooden board with rings embedded on it . The ring rail was given motion by a cam drive. Such a simple system, but giving good results.
I was not allowed to take pictures. However, sooner or later, I will get the pictures and post here.
In my opening blogs I wrote that technology in textiles has to be developed ingenuously to find a niche position in the market. The basic technology is very low in textiles and the machines are far too standard to find flexibility for the user.
Most textile machines are designed to serve the cave man textiles, the users themselves are too lazy to design machines by themselves. It is only rarely one finds that a technician has used his own mind to find a unique solution.
Recently I visited a factory making sewing thread. While as a factory, it is one of the most antiquated, but the most interesting thing was that the owner had practically designed each and every machine by himself. He is not a textile graduate, a raw technician and runs a very large sewing thread operation with quality only to the extent of acceptable at price point.
I will skip writing about his all other machine designs, but one of the most interesting machine that he had designed was that the S and Z twisting together in one operation.
No machine maker under the sun has been able to design such a system, but here was something unique, where 3 yarns are twisted independently on three positions as one for one and then combine on a guide and get fed into a cop which is turning anticlockwise and giving z twist with ring twister. Though the machine is still one for one twisting, yet the system is ingenuous and perfect.
The machine frame was made out of wooden board, the spindles were that of ring twisting on the z twister and the ring rail was a wooden board with rings embedded on it . The ring rail was given motion by a cam drive. Such a simple system, but giving good results.
I was not allowed to take pictures. However, sooner or later, I will get the pictures and post here.
In my opening blogs I wrote that technology in textiles has to be developed ingenuously to find a niche position in the market. The basic technology is very low in textiles and the machines are far too standard to find flexibility for the user.
Most textile machines are designed to serve the cave man textiles, the users themselves are too lazy to design machines by themselves. It is only rarely one finds that a technician has used his own mind to find a unique solution.
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