Ordering Hoodies for the New Year Rush
By The Velocity Wear Team
If branded hoodies need to be in hand for a January intake, place the order in November. Production runs 10 to 15 working days from artwork approval, and December contains far fewer working days than its length suggests once the festive period is taken out. A November approval gives the build clean days either side of the break.
What does the festive shutdown do to a working-day count?
A lead time quoted in working days does not stretch because the calendar is busy, it stretches because the days are not there. A build that starts in mid-December runs across a stretch where public holidays and reduced freight schedules remove a chunk of the working week, so the same 15 working days can span most of a month.
Freight is the other half. Couriers and forwarders run reduced schedules either side of the holidays and the backlog clears slowly into January. A shipment that leaves on time can still sit longer in transit than it would in October, which is why the buffer belongs on the delivery leg rather than the production one.
How many hoodies should a January intake order cover?
Base it on last year rather than on the target. A gym, a club or a studio usually knows roughly how many people joined in the first six weeks of the previous year, and that number is a far better guide than a growth plan. Order to cover it, with the curve weighted to the middle sizes.
Remember the minimum is 50 pieces per design, so a staff hoodie and a member hoodie are two orders of 50 unless the artwork is identical. Where budgets are tight, the usual fix is one design worn by both, with staff distinguished by colourway if the colourway does not need different ink. A repeat later in the year is straightforward, and how closely it will match is covered in reordering wholesale hoodies.
What should a January hoodie actually be?
Something worn indoors in a heated room, then outdoors in the cold on the way home. That pushes towards the middle of the 280 to 450 GSM range rather than either end: substantial enough to feel worth having, not so heavy that it is uncomfortable on a gym floor.
Keep the decoration simple. A small embroidered chest mark suits kit that gets worn constantly and washed hard, and it does not date. Save the large graphic for a retail piece. New members are more likely to wear something that does not look like a uniform.
What is the last sensible moment to order?
Count backwards from the first day you want to hand a hoodie to someone. Subtract transit, allowing extra for the seasonal slowdown. Subtract 15 working days on a calendar rather than 10 in your head. Subtract your own approval time and any label component. Whatever that lands on is your order date, and for most January handovers it falls in the first half of November.
If you are also sampling, that is a separate cycle in front of all of it, so bring the whole thing forward by a fortnight. The £150 sample fee and what it covers are on the samples page, quantities and weights can be set on the wholesale hoodies page, and apparel production lead times explained sets out how the stages fit together.
