Lead Times Retailers Should Plan For
By The Velocity Wear Team
Production takes 10 to 15 working days from artwork approval, which is two to three calendar weeks. Transit to the UK, USA or Europe sits on top of that, and the approval stage itself sits in front of it. A retailer planning a shelf date should work on roughly six weeks from first enquiry, and treat anything faster as a bonus rather than a plan.
Where does the time actually go?
The 10 to 15 working days covers blank allocation, decoration set-up, the run itself, finishing and packing. It is measured in working days deliberately, because weekends and public holidays are not production time. Fifteen working days across a bank holiday weekend is three and a half calendar weeks, which is the arithmetic most shelf plans get wrong.
In front of that sits quoting and approval, which is buyer-controlled and usually the longest variable stage. Behind it sits transit, which depends on destination. The wholesale range shows what can be produced to this timeline, and the samples page covers the stage that runs before the clock starts.
Which stages can a buyer actually shorten?
Approval, and nothing else. A shop that returns a proof the same day rather than the following week has taken a week out of the calendar without asking anyone for a favour. Keep a usable vector logo on file, agree internally who signs off, and decide the garment colour before the proof rather than during it.
The second saving is not shortening the timeline but overlapping it. Order the sample while the range plan is still being argued about, so the £150 stage is finished before the bulk decision is made rather than added to the front of it. Apparel production lead times explained breaks the schedule down stage by stage.
When should a restock be raised so the shelf never empties?
Work from sell-through rate, not from stock level. If a design moves 12 pieces a week and the full cycle is six weeks, the reorder point is 72 pieces plus whatever buffer you want for a good week. Waiting until the rail looks thin puts the gap at six weeks, which for a seasonal product is the season.
The awkward part is that the restock is another 50 minimum, so the reorder decision is also a commitment decision. When to reorder and how much buffer to hold works through how to set that trigger on real sales data.
What resets the clock once it has started?
Any change to the approved artwork, the garment or the size breakdown. A new proof means a new approval, and the 10 to 15 working days runs from the new one. Colour changes are the common culprit, usually because someone pictured the print lighter than it came back. That is precisely what the sample stage exists to prevent, and it is why a late colour decision is the most expensive kind of change a buyer can make.
Does a first order take longer than a repeat?
Considerably, and the difference is all in front of production. A first order carries the sample stage, the proofing round and whatever internal debate produced the artwork. A repeat of an approved design skips all three, so the same 50 pieces can be in the building weeks sooner without anything in the factory moving faster.
That gap is worth building into the buying calendar. Treat a new design as a six-week project and a restock as a three-week one, and the shelf plan stops being a series of surprises. It also argues for getting a design approved early even if the order is placed later, because the slow half is already done by then.
Keep one working calendar rather than tracking each order separately. A shop running three designs will have a sample on one, production on another and a restock decision on the third at any given moment, and the only way that stays manageable is a single sheet with the approval date, the expected ready date and the expected arrival date for each live job.
