Cover Page -- Title Page -- Copyright Page -- Contents -- Preface -- Dedication -- 1: The New Competitive Advantage in Apparel -- Five Decades of Change -- A Dying Industry-or Not? -- The Channel Perspective: Five Propositions -- How This Book Is Organized -- 2: The Past as Prologue: Historical Background on the U.S. Retail, Apparel, and Textile Industries -- Retail: From General Stores to Mass Retailers -- Apparel: From Home Work to Modern Manufacture -- Textiles: From Fiber to Cloth to Finished Product -- Historical Relations Among Retail. Apparel, and Textile Firms -- 3: The Retail Revolution: Traditional Versus Lean Retailing -- The Retail Challenge -- The Elements of Traditional Retailing -- The Growing Costs of Traditional Retailing -- The Lean Retailing Alternative -- 4: The Building Blocks of Lean Retailing -- The Elements of Lean Retailing -- Building Block 1: Bar Codes and the Uniform Product Code -- Building Block 2: EDI and Data Processing -- Building Block 3: The Modern Distribution Center -- Building Block 4: Standards Across Firms -- 5: The Impact of Lean Retailing -- The Relative Performance of Lean Retailers -- How Lean Retailing Affects the Apparel Industry -- What It Takes to Supply a Lean Retailer -- 6: Inventory Management for the Retailer: Demand Forecasting and Stocking Decisions -- The Retail Forecasting Challenge -- Forecasting Demand for Products with a Selling History -- The Impact of Product Variety on Forecast Uncertainty -- Setting Inventory Levels in the Store -- Managing Inventory in a Lean Retailing Environment -- 7: Inventory Management for the Manufacturer: Production Planning and Optimal Sourcing Decisions -- The Key Role of Demand Variability -- Case 1: Inventory Control at a Men's Coat Manufacturer -- Case 2: Multiple Plants and Production Planning -- The Manufacturer's Dilemma in a Lean World.

8: Apparel Operations: Getting Ready to Sew -- The First Step: Apparel Design and Patterns -- Preassembly: Marker-Making -- Preassembly: Spreading -- Preassembly: The Cutting Room -- Bundling the Parts -- Mass Customization -- From Preassembly to Assembly -- 9: Apparel Operations: Assembly and the Sewing Room -- Sewing Machines and Garment Assembly -- What the Sewing Operator Does -- The Sewing Room -- Apparel Assembly and the Demands of Rapid Replenishment -- 10: Human Resources in Apparel -- Increasing Productivity in the Traditional Sewing Room -- Team-Based Assembly and Its Initial Challenges -- Lean Retailing and the Benefits of Modular Assembly -- The Performance Effects of Modular Assembly in a Lean Environment -- Case in Point: The Levi Strauss/UNITE! Partnership Agreement -- Other Human Resource Issues -- 11: Textile Operations: Spinning, Weaving, and Finishing Cloth -- From Lowell to the Modern Textile Mill -- Spinning Yarn from Natural or Synthetic Fibers -- Weaving and Knitting -- Fabric Finishing -- Competitive Challenges -- 12: The Economic Viability of Textiles: A Tale of Multiple Channels -- The Global Industry -- U.S. Performance and Productivity -- The Impact of Different Textile Channels -- The Retail-Apparel-Textile Channel -- Direct Channels for Retail and Industrial Products -- Channel Integration: Still a Challenge -- 13: The Global Marketplace -- Textiles and Apparel in Economic Development -- U.S. Policies on Apparel and Textile Trade -- The Uruguay Round. Phase-Out of the MFA, and NAFTA -- The Product Composition of Trade -- Countries of Origin and the Changing Patterns of Trade -- Regionalization of International Trade -- Beyond the MFA: The End of an Era -- 14: Suppliers in a Lean World: Firm and Industry Performance in an Integrated Channel -- Clusters of Supplier Practices: One Innovation Is Not Enough.

From Supplier Practice to Performance Results -- Management Practice: The Final Ingredient in Enhanced Performance -- 15: Information-Integrated Channels: Public Policy Implications and Future Directions -- Trade Issues: The New International Economics -- Macroeconomic Implications: Inventories, Business Cycles, and Price Levels -- Labor Standards: The Problem of Sweatshops -- The Coming Competitive Landscape -- The Future of Information-Integrated Channels -- Appendix A: List of Acronyms -- Appendix B: The HCTAR Survey -- Appendix C: Data Sources -- Appendix D: Companies Visited or Interviewed by HCTAR -- Notes -- Subject Index -- Name Index -- Business Index.