Custom Hoodie Manufacturers

Advice on materials from a custom hoodie manufacturer

Your choice of ideal fabrics and fabric knit structure will depend on what purpose your hoodies will serve. Exercise-oriented and lounge-oriented pieces will have different demands. Read through and find out what we think is the best choice.

_{Best hoodie fabrics for exercise}

This type of clothing works best when a hoodie manufacturer makes it from synthetic materials. Unless GRS-certified. This is why you should seek to work with certified manufacturers.

Certified recycled polyester clothing with FUSH˚

Since early 2024, we are an official GRS clothing manufacturer. This means we can make recycled polyester clothing with official GRS labelling that your customers will recognize and value.

Certified organic cotton sweatshirts and hoodies with FUSH˚

When you want to ensure your collections come from genuine organic cotton, you will work with a GOTS clothing manufacturer. Such a company provides GOTS labels saying “made with organic” for pieces that contain at least 70% organic cotton and “organic” for pieces that contain at least 95% organic cotton.

Add stretchiness to facilitate movement

Because mobility is critical for exercise clothing, a four-way stretch material with elastane is a perfect choice. We manufacture fabrics like that at our knitting mill – 320 gsm*, 92% polyester 8% elastane blend.

*GSM is short for gram per square meter and it is an industry standard for weighing fabrics.

And for those allergic to synthetic materials, the dual fabric is the answer. This fabric has two layers – a thin cotton layer on the contact surface and a polyester layer on the outside.

How to further improve the sustainability of synthetic hoodies and sweatshirts?

To improve the sustainability of your polyester hoodies, you can avoid dyed and/or bleached fabrics entirely. Instead, we can dye-sublimate the material for your hoodies. That is a much more sustainable process than bleaching and dyeing. Learn more about it on the sublimation clothing page.

Openly advocate for sustainability in fashion

Use your clothing brand as a platform to educate your customers about:

1. Responsible sourcing
2. Responsible buying and wearing
3. Ways to tackle issues connected to polyester clothing, like microplastics

Discuss microplastic filters

You should advocate the use of microplastic filters to show you’re ready to fight for your planet on all fronts. Especially if you sell polyester clothing. In the end, microplastic filter companies aren’t your competition so you can even cross-advertise. Finally, microplastic filters can reduce emissions of this potential pollutant up to 90%!

Best fabrics for non-athletic custom hoodies

Comfort is more important than performance for casual wear and streetwear. For that reason, organic cotton is the ideal fabric of choice.

As for the knit structure, some additional comfort would come with double knit and interlock. Interlock is especially interesting because it is more resistant to post-washing shrinkage.

Certified organic clothing with FUSH˚

Probably the most well-known organic cotton certificate is GOTS by the Global Organic Textile Standard. Since early 2024, you can find us in its database of certified suppliers. This means that we can make hoodies and sweatshirts with official GOTS labels and hang tags.

Benefits of FUSH˚ as your custom hoodie manufacturers

We invest heavily in sustainable production methods and modern machinery. In spring/summer of 2021, we’ve started relying on solar power for electricity almost entirely. Also, we use a wastewater treatment plant to ensure the water that leaves our factory is harmless to nature.

Creating sustainable hoodies with modern machinery

Sustainability should go hand-in-hand with technology advancements. Thanks to CNC fabric cutters and advanced pattern-making software, we now generate not more than 10% of fabric waste from fabric cutting. Our plan for these cutouts is to make them available for companies that make recycled cotton yarn and fabric.

Full customization of hoodies

With FUSH as your custom hoodie manufacturer, you can get:

• Customized patterns
• Extensive choice of printing and embroidering options
• Great choice of materials
• Wide variety of stitches

Pattern customization

Pattern customization allows us full creative freedom when making patterns for your unique hoodies. Because our patternmakers are highly skilled, we can even copy an existing garment from your previous collections. Unless you already have a tech pack.

Printing

• Dye-sublimation
• Screen printing (water-based, discharge, high density, silicone emboss)
• Heat transfer (regular and reflective transfer) 
• Foil stamping (with or without glitter)
• Digital printing (currently only direct-to-fabric but we plan to expand our offer with direct-to-garment variation)

Embroidery

• Standard
• 3D (also known as raised or puffed)
• Chenille
• Sequin
• Rising thread
• Cording

Sustainable hoodies made by sustainable clothing manufacturers

The fashion industry is infamous for its negative impact on the planet and the people from its supply chain. Customers worldwide know this so more and more of them are looking for clothing they won’t feel guilty about.

In addition to certificates like GOTS and GRS, you should look for proof of socially responsibility from hoodie suppliers. A successfully-passed SMETA social responsibility audit is an ideal proof of that.

This is why it’s very important to work with organic cotton hoodie manufacturers. For this, consider only suppliers you can find in the Global Organic Textile Standard (GOTS) database. Here’s our profile in the GOTS database.

If however, you make sweatshirts & hoodies for exercise, you most likely will use polyester. In that case, make sure to use GRS-certified polyester that needs significantly less water and energy than its virgin counterpart. You can find a GRS supplier in Textile Exchange’s database of certified suppliers.

We’re both environment-focused and employee-focused when it comes to sustainability. Use the reasons below to advertise the fact you have a sustainable hoodie manufacturer in your supply chain:

• We will high-quality hoodies using recycled or organic materials. You can show this with GRS and GOTS labels and hangtags on your high-quality hoodies.
• We are a Sedex member and have passed the 4-pillar SMETA audit. This audit is important for ethical clothing manufacturers to show their credibility.
• Workers who make your clothes earn at least 20% more than the national minimum wage. They do not have to work extra hours to earn this salary. Also, whenever they do work overtime, they receive premium rates.
• Our environmental management system follows strict ISO environmental principles, as shown by our ISO 14001:2015 certificate.
• Our mass production facility uses solar power for almost all its electricity needs. This significantly reduces the CO2 emissions of your brand.
• Both of our factories are in Serbia so the distribution of your orders will have significantly lower CO2 emissions if you’re from Europe.

Learn more on the topic: FUSH˚ as a sustainable manufacturer

Take a virtual tour of our factory in Oraovica and see how we make clothing first-hand.

Recently, many brands have asked for custom t-shirts along with custom hoodies. Feel free to do the same if you are interested.

Manufacturing process with FUSH˚ – the ideal scenario

The fastest and least expensive way to work with us as your hoodie manufacturer is to:

1. Prepare a detailed tech pack ahead of time and send it our way
   • Include reference pictures and descriptions of product details in the tech pack
   • The tech pack should have precise positions for any embellishment (printed, embroidered, buttons, etc)
   • It should explain what materials you need, at what weight and colour, and what stitching you prefer
   • It should determine opening dimensions, binding, and top/bottom stitch for neck holes, sleeve openings, and bottom openings
   • Tech pack must have vectorized designs
   • Ideally, it should show grading for each size
2. We analyze the tech pack and determine our asking price and lead time
3. We will deliver your order using the best courier service available if we are unable to do it ourselves.
4. If you have more styles in your tech pack, we will make a sample for each one, if you agree to it (sampling price is €100 per style)
5. We make samples and send them your way for approval
6. Once samples get approval from your end, we’ll charge you 50% for your order and we’ll start mass production
7. As agreed, we will send your order using DHL or our delivery vans, depending on availability.
8. Once we send the order your way, we charge you the remaining 50%

_{Serbia has a free-trade agreement with the EU and UK}

That means importing goods from Serbia will cost as much as importing them from the EU. The only fee you would pay is the fixed customs clearance fee, which’s always around 100€, regardless of the volume of your order. This way, you get cheaper, faster, and more reliable shipping. That’s because your deliveries will come via road instead of sea or air, from a country not too far away from your own.

And if you’re from the UK, you’ll be happy to learn that the situation has become the same as in the EU since 20 May 2021.

Final thoughts

What did we learn today?

To make a great quality hoodie for your brand, you have to find a manufacturer that:

• Has its production lines fitted for a wide range of garments and design options
• Has experienced patternmakers that can recreate garment samples you send
• Works with various fabrics of different weights
• Has previous experience with fashion brands
• Has a portfolio of different hoodie designs
• Can prove it’s sustainable and ethical (social responsibility audits like SMETA are a great proof)
• Makes hoodies with sustainable hang tag labels that will increase the trust of your customers
• Runs a nearshoring type of manufacturing (caters to markets geographically nearest to its production facilities)
• Can offer competitive prices

Luckily for you, FUSH˚ ticks all these boxes. So now there’s nothing left to do but to send us an enquiry about our potential cooperation.

FAQ

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