Turkey’s textile industry is showing strong signs of recovery following the global financial crisis, but it is currently struggling to meet the demands of its European customers, an industry expert has said.

“Our crucial problem today is to find contract-manufacturers. We have the orders, but we can’t find facilities to produce,” said Nedim Örün, Turkish Fashion and Apparel Federation, or TMFH, president, adding that the sector is currently working at full capacity and manufacturers can choose between customers.

The organization represents ready wear, underwear, knitwear and sock producers, confectionery subsidiaries, embroiders and designers from several cities.

“The current situation offers new opportunities to manufacturers who were not exporting during the crisis,” Örün said. “We want to pass orders to facilities that laid-off workers but still own machinery,” he said, adding that customers were ready to pay for machines to be restarted.

It is the right time for manufacturers to go back into business, as profit margins are higher today, he said. “The value of a blouse has risen from 0.65 Turkish liras to 1.65 liras,” he said.

Online hub

The Aegean Clothes Industry Association has launched a study to reveal the potential in western Turkey, Örün said, along with a project that aims to introduce contract-manufacturers and industrialists. The association works through digital infrastructure to boost online communication and cooperation between the parties, Örün said. The main idea behind the project is to determine the particular dates that are unproductive and integrate them with the needs of exporters. “We want to spread the project throughout Turkey.”

Exporters are trying to provide privileges to their old customers as they are forced to make choices among demands, he said, adding that price was the main criteria in picking up new customers.

Even in the eastern province of Denizli, where some businessmen committed suicide because of exceptionally poor market conditions, production is improving, he said. Fabric, home textiles and apparel manufacturers in the province are working at full capacity, Örün said.

Facilities re-open

About 20 percent of facilities in Merter that closed because of the global financial crisis have been re-opened, said Ercan Tan, head of the Merter Industrialist’s and Businessmen’s Association, an organization active in Istanbul’s heart of textiles. A significant amount of global ready wear and apparel demand is returning to Turkey, Tan said, adding that many manufacturers in Merter have started rotating production through three shifts a day.

Tan said in the last five years manufacturers were running their businesses at cost. “The rise in demand brings opportunities for them. They are adding 10 to 20 percent profit margins to total costs today.”

Competition between customers is an advantage for manufacturers, he said.

His company used to cooperate with 20 contract-manufacturers in the past, Tan said. “But recently this number fell to four, as the rest locked their doors.”

Now, former customers were calling these companies to re-open their facilities because of outstanding, long-term orders, he said.

The industry achieved a yearly 12.3 percent increase in exports for September, compared with the same month last year.