Flexibility has been the key to success for both brands and manufacturers as both face more challenging market conditions.
“Our strategy is choosing great raw materials to make the best products at the lowest possible price,” said Nattapong Tummachudpong at Double Star Industry Co., Ltd.
This vertically integrated company includes spinning, weaving, dyeing & finishing, printing, embroidery and garment manufacturing. Although they make many kinds of textiles, their specialty is terry.
“We pride ourselves on being very flexible. Whatever a customer wants, we will try to do it. For example, if a customer has a specific type of product that they want to make, we’ll look at the construction and figure out what’s possible. Then we’ll offer some options to them,” he said.
“We listen to customers, and we try to continually improve our production and our efficiency, as well as trying to minimize costs.”
For Double Star, flexibility goes beyond the manufacturing process and includes the kinds of products they are able to make.
Investing in Innovation
The company also has its own R&D team and has developed some function-based products, including the newest technology that they invented called Deo Fresh. Keeping sustainability in mind, it uses the properties of cornstarch, which is natural material, to encapsulate odor. This odor controlling solution can be applied to cotton products.
Double Star can make anything that is woven. Since they have their own spinning mills, they are able to work on developing new yarns, including core hallow yarns, zero twist yarns, ring spun yarns, combed and carded, and OE spinning.
Choosing Great Raw Materials
Materials really do make a difference in the final product, so much so that even though they need to offer competitive prices for their products, Double Star still chooses to use the best quality cotton.
“Our strategy is choosing great raw materials to make the best products at the lowest possible price.”
“We use U.S. cotton because it is best for our spinning mills to work with. In terms of the cleanliness and the quality of the yarn, when yarn is made from U.S. cotton we have no problems. Also the finished products are excellent because U.S. cotton has very good color absorption and evenness.
“Through the COTTON USA SOLUTIONS™ program, they send technicians to visit our mills and help us with advice on how to minimize problems, reduce costs, and improve efficiency,” said Mr. Tummachudpong.
Now as members of the U.S. Cotton Trust Protocol®, Double Star is able to further support its commitment to a sustainable and transparent supply chain.
“As we open more export markets, I think that will be very beneficial. Retail brands want greater transparency and sustainability because it’s very important for their reputations,” he said.
A Mark of Quality for Consumers
In addition to manufacturing, Double Star has its own brand, Frolina, which specializes in home textiles.
“From a marketing perspective, the COTTON USA™ brand is very powerful in Thailand and other key ASEAN countries. Consumers see the COTTON USA™ mark on product labeling as a sign of very high quality,” he said.
“Although the past two years have been challenging, I think the market is growing and there are a lot of opportunities for us to pursue, especially the international markets. We have a lot of products and services to offer, and so we feel optimistic about the future,” said Mr. Tummachudpong.
Email. info@doublestaricl.com
Tel. +66-0-2816-3190-9 | https://www.doublestaricl.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
