When brands look for high end pure cotton yarn they come to The Phiphatanakit Textile Co. The company is a specialist in spinning premium cotton yarn for niche customers who want the very best raw materials.
“We use very high quality cotton regardless of the product category we are making, so the end product will always be of top quality. We use U.S. cotton and some Australian cotton – no exceptions. When we order our cotton we have certain specifications so that the cotton meets our standards. So we’re not just randomly buying the cheapest cotton that we can get. We decide what we want first, based on what we want the final products to be like – and then we purchase our cotton to meet these requirements,” said Suphakon Pinyawat.
The company’s ‘quality first’ strategy has helped to place it at the top of a very competitive market.
“To survive in this business quality must come first because as you can see, there are many competitive spinning mills out there – in Thailand and in other countries. So if we can’t maintain our quality it’s going to be very difficult for us to maintain our place in the market. So quality actually must come first and then we focus on price,” he said.
“To survive in this business, quality must come first.”
The company relies on U.S. cotton to help it maintain a consistent level of high quality in all of its products.
“Our customers prefer U.S. cotton because it is a cut above other cotton. In terms of preparation U.S. cotton is definitely more reliable because the consistency is very high and there’s a lot of information about each bale of cotton so it makes it easier for us to manage our production.
“U.S. cotton is more expensive, however there is very little waste and when we put it into the spinning process this means that we actually save costs and can operate more efficiently,” said Mr. Pinyawat.
Transparency and Trust
One of the biggest challenges that brands face is great scrutiny of their supply chains. However, achieving a more transparent supply chain is not always easy.
“We joined the U.S. Cotton Trust Protocol® (the Trust Protocol) to make it easier for our customers to trust that the product we are supplying is truly what we claim it is. It proves that we are actually using U.S. cotton and that this cotton is grown using sustainable practices.
“More brands want to use cotton because it is one of the best raw materials as it comes from a natural source. Brands want to focus on more environmentally friendly products and as a Trust Protocol member they will see us as their potential partner because our goals align,” said Mr. Pinyawat.
Meeting Market Challenges
One of the biggest challenges that both buyers and suppliers face right now is the surge in raw materials prices.
Phiphatanakit Textile faces this same pressure however it does have an advantage as a supplier of premium cotton yarns.
“Customers now need to raise the prices for their products since their costs have gone up. But to do this they need to improve their product quality. Right now places like Pakistan and Bangladesh are buying a lot from us because they say our quality is better.”
“It’s difficult to know what might happen in the macro economy so we are focusing on the day-to-day, making sure our quality remains good, that our factory is prepared and that we have enough inventory to meet our production runs. That’s what we are focusing on right now,” said Mr. Pinyawat.
Email. Phiphatanakit.mill@gmail.com | Tel. +66 2 249 0331 | https://www.ptexmill.com
Certified Sustainable
The Trust Protocol is aligned with existing sustainability programs including the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals. It brings quantifiable and verifiable goals and measurement to sustainable cotton production, and drives continuous improvement in six key sustainability metrics – land use, soil carbon, water management, soil loss, greenhouse gas emissions, and energy efficiency. The Trust Protocol is designed from the ground up to address the unique regulatory and larger farm growing environment in the United States.
How the Trust Protocol Works
The Protocol Consumption Management Solution (PCMS) starts at the gin when the participating producer’s cotton is ginned and each unique Permanent Bale Identification number (PBI) is attached. At this point we know the exact gin weight and can create an exact amount of Protocol Cotton Consumption Units, where one Protocol Cotton Consumption Unit is created for each kilogram of Protocol Verified Cotton. This important step provides absolute authentication of U.S. cotton origin, verifying against the USDA database.
Supply Chain Transparency
The PCMS harnesses blockchain technology through a powerful combination of the Trust Protocol platform and TextileGenesis™ system to deliver full supply chain transparency by recording and verifying the movement of U.S. cotton along the entire supply chain. This creates article-specific transparency for finished products that was not previously accessible to brands and retailers.
Trusted Third Party Certification
The Trust Protocol incorporates a comprehensive program of verification against Trust Protocol benchmarks, in the form of both second-party and independent third-party audits of grower performance through Control Union Certifications—the latter through allocated on-site visits.
Control Union Certifications has certified over 150 industry standards programs worldwide, including working as a key partner in the early development and piloting phases of Impact Claim Verification Protocol.
Learn More https://trustuscotton.org
The COTTON USA Advantage
- Family growers who are committed to working their fields sustainably and leaving them better for future generations.
- A long history of innovative harvesting and ginning technologies resulting in higher-quality cotton.
- One of the highest rates of adoption in the world for Precision Agriculture, which minimizes water and pesticide usage.
- U.S. farmers operate under voluminous, stringent, and enforceable regulations.
- A commitment to transparent partnership that is unmatched anywhere.
- One of the most comprehensive systems for monitoring and measuring all the key metrics involved in sustainability.
U.S. Cotton Facts
- 2/3 of U.S. cotton land uses only rain water
- U.S. cotton water use efficiency has improved by 79% over the past 35 years
- Cotton is carbon footprint neutral, meaning the plants remove more greenhouse gasses than production produces.
Sustainability Goals
The U.S. cotton industry is building upon the strong environmental gains already achieved over the past 35 years. The aim is to help members meet their current needs while making the world a better place for future generations.
Specific goals include:
- Reducing by 13 percent the amount of land needed to produce a pound of cotton fiber
- Reducing soil loss by 50 percent, in balance with new soil formation
- Increasing water use efficiency (more fiber per gallon) by 18 percent
- Reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 39 percent
- Increasing soil carbon in fields by 30 percent
- Reducing energy to produce seed cotton and ginned lint by 15 percent
Learn More www.cotton.org
