Skill Issue - clothes for technologists

The REINDUSTRIALIZE sweater. 100% cotton, to look good while you’re working to reindustrialize America. Made by Skill Issue, a luxury brand for technologists. Buy: skillissuesf.com/products/reind…

@killinger_95944 @zachkowalik Yes, we are losing product by selling it. Please hope for more, it means a lot.

@skillissuesf @zachkowalik I hope you lose everything.

The REINDUSTRIALIZE sweater. 100% cotton, to look good while you’re working to reindustrialize America. Made by Skill Issue, a luxury brand for technologists. Buy: skillissuesf.com/products/reind…

@jv_goddard @thewoolshire @dieworkwear You are comparing RL with a startup brand, the budgets are not the same.

@skillissuesf @thewoolshire “Bring production to the US!” by supporting overseas manufacturing… you couldn’t make this up! As @dieworkwear pointed out, RL was easily able to make their jumper in the US & support local manufacturing. I’m also positive their qc threshold is much higher than yours.

Please watch out for people and brands trying to brand themselves as American when manufacturing overseas. They said they “couldn’t find an American factory” and then later said “their MOQ was 50 so they couldn’t find someone to do it”. Ok? There’s plenty of small American knitting companies that would knit 50 sweaters for you. If it’s about margin, then make other sweaters that don’t imply that you’re contributing to the rebuilding of America. I’m not trying to trash them, but please don’t mock American re-industrialization by making something like this overseas with foreign material. Small companies should know better. Don’t be like the big boys who’ve lost their soul.

We tried. Most either wouldn’t take small MOQs, or had 6+ month waitlists plus another ~2 months for production. As a new brand with a team and real costs, that timeline just wasn’t viable. So we produced where we could launch now, while working toward bringing it back to the US.

@skillissuesf I'm well aware. What I don't understand is why you didn't just do that from the start instead of going to Portugal.

Believe it or not there already are vertically integrated clothing manufacturers in the USA. Here's one. I'd seek one out to do a real Reindustrialize sweater, but I'm not American so that would be dishonest.

@dsforbesm1 Oh didn't realize that most of the Americans don't take their vacations in Croatia. Must have mixed up something.

@skillissuesf Why are you worried about made in America when you are from Croatia?

@ValtheRobot Um... not really.

@skillissuesf This looks like a misprint you get for 2$ at a swap meet.

It's mostly because for a small brand to get custom clothes produced in US it's impossible because they require huge MOQ's. So this way, we are getting a demand so we can have higher MOQ's and produce in US. Why wouldn't we produce in US if it's easier in every possible sense? For us it wasn't even about 'affordable' because we chose premium across all parts of production so it's not even price related.

@abemurray @skillissuesf Not made in America though

When you’re constantly getting the same answer that nobody will work with you unless you’re ordering huge MOQs 3 months is a long time. People don't seem to understand how difficult it is to get it produced. We produced it where we could get the quality we wanted - while working toward bringing production home. So instead of just giving up - we did it and at the same time we are getting our production in US developed.

@skillissuesf @zachkowalik Three whole months! Well damn, that’s like zero time.

@ppppp1245688 Where it’s made doesn’t automatically make it cheap. This is high-quality cotton, low-volume production, and expensive manufacturing plus importing, duties, and logistics. If we had US option, don't you think we would go for it?

You're charging $320 for THIS?! And it's not even American-made???

@real_seansean @Bfaviero Nope, we are better than streetwear brands because our products are actually durable & people love to wear them!

@Bfaviero @skillissuesf Totally. It's a meme sweater. No better than streetwear brand ripping off real designers.

You are aware that producing small quantity clothes at a good quality, where you don't just customize a catalogue of existing product with a logo is almost impossible in US at this moment? Everybody needs large quantities if you want something custom made, so no - this is not a cash grab, we had no other choice. Ideology still remains for us.

@Andrew_Moser Made in portugal. Team based outside of the USA. Connected to x from Croatia. Grifting at its finest.

Reindustrialize Made overseas somewhere.

@KStarfucker @prairiefawkes @zachkowalik If US manufacturing at this level was accessible towards smaller quantities, every brand would be doing it. It isn’t.

@prairiefawkes @skillissuesf @zachkowalik The “process” is to perpetuate and profit off the problem to begin with. One day someone *else* will hopefully bring an American produced “luxury” sweater to market and he can undercut them.

@liam_mcknight @dom_rocc0 You can’t start a brand at this quality + small scale and manufacture in the US on day one. We'll get there.

@dom_rocc0 @skillissuesf It’s textiles bro. Marketing and design are the value to capture here

@jakobdiepen @DenverRayburn We’re in his DMs. Thank you! We literally couldn’t find a USA manufacturer who could make this at such low MOQs.

.@DenverRayburn can make this in America btw

@alessio_joseph @jameygannon There’s no copyright in fashion, and you can’t have a trademark on the American flag.

@skillissuesf @jameygannon more so that i’m a fan of bootlegging but i’d be worried about a lawsuit!

I assure you every single company in the GUNDO built their prototype with some parts made in China, and as they used that prototype to raise money, they’re investing that money in vertically integrating in the USA. People are delusional if they think reindustrializing isn’t going to be a process.

@__mihir @zachkowalik If you can find us a factory in the US that can produce this quality for us at 50 MOQ, we’ll give you $1,000.

@skillissuesf @zachkowalik I can probably figure this out for you made in the USA. If I source them for you can you give me 35% cut?

Honestly, I thought they’d be more supportive of the long term-vision. Start-ups aren’t perfect when they start. But tech really don’t understand manufacturing. I assure you every single company in the GUNDO built their prototype with some parts made in China, and as they raise money, they’re vertically integrating in the USA.

@skillissuesf you had to know ppl would cook you for this tho 😫

@alessio_joseph @jameygannon They have billions of dollars, are producing huge MOQs, and probably built their own factory.

@jameygannon ralph lauren might have something to say about this 😭