top of page

History of Gildan | Best Blanks For Your Clothing Brand

A goal for 2024 is to create the best luxury blanks brand that I can bring to you on demand. I have seen a small gap in the market for luxury, accessible blanks and I am determined to fill that gap.


With every new business, it is important to plan. I recently posted a 2 part series on how to write a business plan which you can watch here. Within a business plan, there is a chapter titled Market Research and within the market research chapter, there is a section called competitor analysis.


In this series of blogs, I want to document my competitor analysis with you, looking into notable brands within the garments blanks space. We are starting with Gildan.




History of Gildan

Before there was Gildan, there was a children's apparel manufacturing company called Harley Inc. Harley Inc. was founded in 1942 by Joseph Chamandy in Montreal, Canada. In 1982, Josephs grandsons took over the company. They acquired a knitting mill and became a knitting manufacturing business called Gildan Textiles. The reason why they acquired the knitting mill was because they wanted to produce their textiles to reduce production costs.


They began to overproduce fabric, so with this excess fabric, they decided to bulk-produce t-shirts for printing and eventually became a leader in manufacturing quality basic apparel. Harley Inc. closed in 1992.


Fast forward to the present day, Gildan has factories in Honduras which allows them to have super low-priced T-shirts. You can get a Gildan T-shirt for as little as £2.


Gildan has 6 main collections

  • Softstyle

  • Hammer

  • Dry Blend

  • Heavy Cotton

  • Ultra Cotton

  • Heavy Blend


Distribution-wise Gildan has worldwide distribution and you have to find a stockist to get your hands on a Gildan product typically. There are plenty of stockists online including buytshirtonline. Gildan retail has additional styles that it seems you can only get from Amazon.


Now with the blank brand I want to start, I will be focusing on the following products.

  • T-shirts: 100% ringspun cotton: 300gsm

  • Hoodies: 100% French terry cotton: 450gsm

  • Crewnecks: 100% French terry cotton: 450gsm

  • Sweatpants: 100% French terry cotton: 450gsm


I wanted to see if there are any comparable products from Gildan. This is so that I can look at their price point and their offerings.


Let's start with the T-shirt, the closest spec I could find was the Gildan Hammer. Here is the spec below:

  • Weight: 203gsm

  • Material: 100% ringspun cotton

  • Size range: Small to 4XL

  • 13+ Colours

  • Price for a single: £4.62


Hoodie-wise, I had to pick between fabric composition and weight. It seems like Gildan doesn't have hoodies in 100% cotton or French terry. So I settled on the Gildan DryBlend which is 50% cotton and 50% polyester.

  • Weight: 305gsm

  • Material: 50% cotton, 50% polyester

  • Size range: Small to 2XL

  • 14 Colours

  • Price for a single: £17.28


Let's take a look at the crewnecks, the closest spec I could find was also the Gildan DryBlend, part of the same collection of the hoodie I selected. Here is the spec below:

  • Weight: 305gsm

  • Material: 50% cotton, 50% polyester

  • Size range: Small to 2XL

  • 9 Colours

  • Price for a single: £12.36


It doesn't seem like Gildan has sweatpants that are readily available on stockists' websites.


With every competitor analysis, we have to take a look at the strengths and weaknesses of Gildan when compared to the blank brand I want to start.


Strengths

Weaknesses

Low prices

Limited maximum weight for T-shirts and Hoodies

Great range of products and weights

No 100% cotton hoodies in French terry

Great range of colours

Negative connotations with using Gildan blanks

On-demand delivery

Prices seem too low

Plenty of stockists

Outdated cuts




All the information in this blog is to the best of my knowledge from research carried out online.

191 views0 comments

Comments


bottom of page